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eden mccain

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The seconds seem interminable, tight rope only growing tighter the more Elvis struggles, cutting off his air supply, and this — this isn't what he wanted. It isn't what he wants now, anyway, and in the moment (one more wasted spent thinking about it), that's all that really seems important, not what made him get up on a chair with a rope around his neck, but what made him change his mind. Anabelle's sunflowers are still bright enough with the sun beating down on them that the room is cast aglow, and even with his vision dimming at the edges, he tries to hold on to that as his feet kick at the broken chair, trying to find purchase on its edge, though it feels like it only gets farther away rather than closer. An eleventh hour save if there ever was one, enough to practically redefine the term, this would be utterly unbelievable if he weren't presently living it, if he weren't without time to spare on any more skepticism, if it had actually yet saved him at all, something he's becoming increasingly aware he can't count on.

(God, to die just after deciding to live — it goes beyond ironic into poetic, or like some sort of cautionary tale, the dangers of attempting suicide when you might just wind up not wanting to do so after all. He'd laugh, if there were air in his lungs with which to do so.)

In light of one miracle, it really does seem unfair to ask for a second, but all he can do is want anyway, harder than he thinks he's wanted in a long damn time, for just one more, for not just confirmation that they do exist but the opportunity to see it through this, to try to put right what he got wrong before. Things are still fucked, but that doesn't matter. These flowers, growing up out of dry, infertile dirt, they're hope, and that's all Elvis has needed. After losing everything else, it isn't like there's a lot he could have asked for anyway. This one thing, though — well, it's this one thing or nothing else, and he doesn't want to die just after finding out how wrong he was. He doesn't want to die at all. This miracle picked a hell of a time to make itself known, but then, he thinks that might be part of what makes it a miracle in the first place. A second chance, like Anabelle coming back to life on the embalming table, except hopefully, he won't go so far. That's the sort of thing that only gets to happen once.

When his foot meets the chair, steady enough to actually be worth something, it's a tenuous hold, but at least it's there, holding up enough of his weight that he can sip his fingers under the noose, barely noticing the way the rope tears at the skin on his knuckles, leaving them raw and stinging. It's only adrenaline keeping him going now, or sheer determination or some combination of the two, but go he does; little by little, the pressure is relieved, until finally, finally, he drops to the ground, rope left swinging above him, aching but mercifully alive. She was right.

His hands move to his throat as he fights for air, more difficult than it ought to be for the way he's simultaneously coughing and gasping for breath, eyes mostly shut. It hurts — fuck, everything hurts, which ought to be counterintuitive but actually isn't at all — but surprisingly enough, he finds it difficult to care just yet. Bruises and a sore throat, he can deal with, if they mean he isn't dead. Curled on his side, he continues forcing in short, shallow inhales despite his burning lungs, oblivious to the fact that the floor he's on isn't his own.

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It's just a relief Claire isn't home.

That's the first thing to cross Eden's mind as she steps out of the next room, searching for whatever made that heavy falling sound. The rope swings overhead, bounces almost giddily in the air, the broken chair fallen to the ground with the boy who must have been atop it, and she doesn't want the girl she's been protecting to see this. She nearly brought a weapon with her out here, though the thought of so much as looking at either of her guns makes her stomach turn still; she's glad she didn't. This isn't someone who needs a pistol in his face just now.

What he needs is medical attention, a fact she's duly aware of as she hurries to his side now that she knows it isn't some intruder (old instincts die hard and she still tenses at strange noises at night, though the jungle is full of them). Crouching down, she puts a hand to his shoulder, not sure what the protocol is for helping someone who's nearly died — nearly killed himself, she thinks, and that brings that same gut-wrenching feeling, tightens her throat. She's been down that road, wouldn't wish it on anyone. "Just keep breathing," she says, "take it easy, you're alright. We should get you to a doctor."

Elvis doesn't notice the presence of anyone else until the woman is at his side, and there's a moment where not even that seems out of place, though it's clear from the way she speaks that she isn't a local. He's not dead — it is, at first, all he can think about, each stinging breath nothing but pure relief, though he practically shakes with the effort it takes to try to draw them deeper. The touch does startle, and it shows, but what quickly takes over his focus is the last sentence, prompting him to shake his head between coughs, not even bothering not to wince at the movement. A doctor is just about the last thing he needs, if only because he's sure that would come with media attention of its own, and he's reasonably certain that a suicide attempt would only add fuel to their fire, seem to prove them right about him rather than so completely wrong, as if he'd only have the one reason to want to hang himself.

It's that thought, what the press would think, that brings him back to himself a little more. He shut the house up good before he tried anything, too fed up to deal with any more reporters; she seems remarkably kind for someone who seems to have just tried her hand at breaking and entering, but if she did, he'll have little kindness of his own to spare. Pushing back a little, he tries to sit up, breaths at least coming slightly easier now. "Who are you?" he asks, what's meant to be a demand, but between the hoarseness of his voice and the fact that he sounds closer to freaked out than angry, the desired effect doesn't come across. "And how'd you get —"

The question cut off by a look at his surroundings, his eyes go wide, and then there's no way he could seem anything less than spooked. The chair is still near him, the rope still swinging from the ceiling, but this isn't the room he was just in, doesn't even look like part of home at all. It doesn't make sense. Trying to ignore the worry that he might just be dead after all — that wouldn't make sense, either — he fixes his gaze on the woman again, half-desperate. "Where am I?"

"Shh, shh," Eden says, leaning back without taking her hand off his shoulder, "it's fine, don't strain your throat talking. I'm Eden. You're in my house." It's a relief to hear his voice, no matter how the way it sounds shakes her. He was close, so close, to turning up here a different way, almost too late. For all she knows, back home, he was. It's not unheard of here. He's had enough of a scare without her launching into the particulars too fast, but that's just as much reason not to be too slow about it, leave him waiting for answers.

"It's going to sound crazy, but you just... appeared here from wherever you were." She eases carefully to her feet. How long before Claire gets home from visiting with friends? She needs to get that rope down before that happens. It's starting to slow its swing, at least, though she thinks it might spook her just as much hanging still. Her pulse leaps in her throat, but she won't think about it, her own arrival. Instead she crosses over to grab a cup she's brought home from the Compound, fill it with water from the sink. God, she never thought she'd be so pleased to have basic amenities, but that's living on an island for you. As she speaks, she brings it back to him, holding it out. "You're in the jungle now, on an island called Tabula Rasa, and no, I don't know any better than you how that happened."

Elvis blinks a few times, shakes his head again, not wanting to believe her. He wouldn't, either, save for the simple fact that this so clearly isn't his own house. It's a lot of information, anyway, inducing confusion more than incredulity, his head spinning, the rush of blood pounding in his ears. More instinctive than anything else, and to delay having to respond to something that he doesn't have the first clue how to respond to, he takes the cup of water, gulping it too quickly and choking again for his trouble, though he waves a hand to dismiss any potential concern. Other than a name and the apparent fairy tale she's telling him, he doesn't know her at all, and sure as hell doesn't need her pity. He made a choice and it was the wrong one and he's dealing with — living with — the effects of it, that's all.

"You're right," he says, at least having the sense to speak more quietly this time, "that does sound crazy." Crazy might even be an understatement, but then, he's seen a girl come back to life on an embalming table and a field of sunflowers sprout up in dirt that couldn't grow anything; he doubts he's in any position to judge. If there's one thing he's figured out, it's that something sounding crazy doesn't make it impossible. Slumping back down to the floor, he stares up at her ceiling for a few seconds, watching the rope swing out of the corner of his eye. It's at once both unsettling and strangely comforting, like that in itself is proof that he survived. Still, there's an uncertainty in his expression when he looks at her again, like he doesn't know what to make of her, of this, of any of it (and how could he?). "This isn't — I'm not dead, am I?" He doesn't think so — if nothing else, the way it hurts should be proof of that — but what the hell. He might as well be sure, with as fantastical as this seems.

"I don't think so," Eden says. It's not the most comforting answer she could give, she knows that, since that ought to be the kind of thing easily answered, but it isn't here. She, of all people, should know that, and she isn't about to lie to him just to set his mind at ease, as much as she'd like to keep him calm. It wouldn't be right to lie, though she know people do it all the time for the sake of comfort, like Bennet saying he'd attended her funeral when she never received a proper one; she knows that now. "Looks to me like you got free. And this isn't an afterlife." Not strictly speaking, at least.

"It's more like... a waystation. You come here, stay a while, go back home. I don't know why. But it's definitely not heaven. Or hell or whatever's in between." She's not sure she believes in any of that anyway. It feels like an excuse, something to placate. She doesn't want to hold her breath hoping for more.

Illogical though the very premise is, Elvis nods, figuring he's better off taking her word for it. It's still a lot, to be sure far more information than he even has the first idea what to do with, but at the very least, if she says he's not dead, he's inclined to believe it. If he were, what reason would there be for a stranger to lie about it? Of all of it, though, that seems the simplest aspect. He's here, he's alive, he's breathing, he succeeded in saving his own damn life. That would be the case whether he were here, apparently transported to some place he's never heard of, or on his own floor. As for the rest, he doesn't know what to make of it. Probably, he thinks, he should be a little more startled by the prospect, or at least a little more surprised, but as it is, save for his relief in not being dead and the physical pain that's a result of it, he finds it difficult to feel much of anything at all. None of this seems quite real yet, more like a dream or a hallucination than something actually happening. Things like this aren't supposed to happen, and unlike Anabelle's sunflowers, he doesn't know what it means.

"Alright," he says, figuring he ought to say something. After all, he did presumably just appear out of nowhere in the middle of her house after a clear suicide attempt, and as much as he doesn't want pity or anything of the sort, is hesitant to take any of this at face value, her kindness isn't unappreciated. Throat still hoarse, he tries his best to clear it, though doing so doesn't make it feel any less hoarse. "So... what's all this about an island?"

There's probably no use in telling him not to talk. Eden knows she wouldn't listen, that's for damn sure, not in a situation like this, though he really ought to save himself the trouble. Her first instinct is still to get him looked at by a doctor; unlike herself, showing up after the fact, this is going to leave a physical reminder, not just blood and memories. "You're on one," she says. "Tropical. Definitely not deserted. There's a few hundred people around here, a little community. It's nice. It's a good place to be."

Granted, she'll never see the world, never travel, and there's a part of her that wants to say that instead, to say to him that he was trying to throw away something she'll never get back, something he should celebrate instead, but whatever drove him to this, he isn't going to feel like rejoicing. People don't just hang themselves for no reason. And there's too much for him to take in without her saying he may not be dead, but she was.

Unable to shake the sense that there's something left unsaid that he ought to be picking up on, Elvis looks at her curiously as he goes back over it, taking it in. All things considered, it doesn't actually sound so bad; just about anything beats home, anyway, assuming he's far enough gone that those papers with the picture of him and Anabelle won't have made it here. It wasn't just the hit his reputation took that made him stand on that chair, nor was it the fact that he'd probably never be able to work again, but it sure as hell didn't help, especially not when he knows what people are like. Even with charges dropped, even if he did somehow manage to clear his name, no one would ever forget. That sort of thing sticks with a person.

He catches himself thinking that he has nothing left back there, though, and immediately corrects himself. That isn't true, not anymore. It may yet prove to be, but what he has now is a chance, a shot at everything not being quite so fucked, and he doesn't mean to let it pass him by. Eyes narrowing, he tries to ignore what feels like dread in the pit of his stomach (Anabelle would be proud of him for that), drawing in a deeper, steadier breath before he speaks again. "And how do I get back?"

Drawing her legs toward herself, Eden leans against them. "You don't," she says, "not yet. I'm sorry. If there's a secret to it, no one's left it behind. They just... go. Same as you got here, out of nowhere." Not the attempted suicide part, and she can't help glancing up again at that rope for just a moment as she thinks it. Not like that. It makes her queasy just thinking about it, and she should say something, she knows she should, but just being here is enough to deal with for a moment. She can talk to him about it after this, if he'll let her. At least he's managed to get free, at least he seems interested enough in what's going on; it makes her think he isn't just going to try again the moment she turns her back. It's not a guarantee there won't be another attempt, but not today, not yet, she has that much.

Of course. That is, at first, the only thing Elvis can think, though his face doesn't change for it, staying carefully neutral. Of course he'd get hope, proof of things not being quite so desolate, only to have it taken away again. Of course he'd wind up God knows how many miles away from Anabelle, surely too far to try to make amends. It's what he expected, but it isn't what he wanted, and this, this is why he didn't want to listen to her, this is what made him do what he almost did. (That realization doesn't hit as hard as the sensation that accompanies it. Hearing this, letting the news sink in, it doesn't hurt, but rather leaves him feeling startlingly empty, just like when he opened the cupboard and found that rope.) Under perhaps any other circumstances, he'd be quick to accuse her of joking, but like this, he doubts anyone could be quite so cruel. For that matter, he has no idea what reason she would have to lie. All things considered, this isn't any worse than what he's been through the past while (the past few years), but there's no rule that says he has to like it. "So what you're tellin' me is I'm stuck here," he says flatly. This time, it isn't a question.

"Yes." Eden considers turning away so she'll stop seeing that rope out of the corner of her eyes, and wonders when she became so squeamish. If anything, she thinks, dying should have made anything else seem simple, small. There's not much that compares to that. There's not much that hurts more than the idea of someone willfully giving up that chance either, the one she's been given more times than she's deserved.

"I'm sorry," she murmurs. "I know that's... difficult." Most people have something to go back to, anyway, even the dead ones. "But for now, it's just the truth. Until I don't know when, you're stuck here."

"Great," Elvis says, with a tight, thin, so obviously insincere smile, nothing about this seeming great at all. (That's a lie. He's alive and he so nearly wasn't, and that's great, except it all feels a little pointless now, a heavy weight slowly settling back into his shoulders, uninvited but inevitable.) He ought to be nicer, he knows — Anabelle would call him a jerk, and he has really got to stop thinking about what she would say when he's apparently a world away from her now — but he thinks he makes it clear anyway that he has no quarrel with Eden. All she did was find him on her floor and give him some water. It isn't her fault that the news she has to deliver is among the worst he could have received. Exhaling heavily, he lets his expression soften, gaze dropping to the floor. "Yeah, difficult is one way of putting it," he adds. The whole talking about feelings thing may have never been his gig, but if only because of the circumstances, and the questions he knows she isn't asking, he doesn't think a little honesty is too awful. "Not exactly what I was planning on."

"I can see that," Eden says quietly, gaze drifting briefly to the chair beyond him. She doesn't try to hide that. It's not something she's supposed to know, but that's the way this place works, people showing up out of the blue, so often at the least convenient moment possible. Something changed his mind, though, thank god for that. She just hopes it stays changed. She'll have to get that thing down herself later, drag one of her own chairs over, just to keep from giving him the opportunity here and now, but there's rope enough down in the Compound. If he won't let her take him to a doctor, odds are good he won't let her take him over to the psych office either.

"This place is different," she says. "I don't just mean tropical, it's — it's strange. You showed up out of nowhere and it doesn't stop there. It's like... something out of the Twilight Zone, like a crazy person's dream. People have showed up here after they died before. I don't think you did or that wouldn't be here with you, but it's been known to happen."

Elvis wants to ask how much more like the Twilight Zone it can get than a girl coming back to life before his very eyes, but he just nods instead, not about to try and explain that whole ordeal. With what she's said so far, he's pretty sure it's irrelevant now, anyway. It's not like Anabelle will be here, wherever here is — that would be too much to ask for, and sure as hell too much to hope for — and he's pretty sure that if her name were going to be of any significance, Eden would have recognized him, their stories too intertwined now for one to go without the other. Much as it sucks, he can't pretend like he didn't bring it on himself.

"I wasn't gonna do it," he says instead, looking at his hands, fingertips brushing over scraped knuckles. He owes her no explanation, but he did show up in her house, bringing all of this with him. She could have the wrong idea and it wouldn't matter, people have assumed worse, but it seems like the sort of thing to clear up even so, if only so they won't have to dance around the subject. That would just be pointless. "Or, I was, but... I changed my mind. That was when the chair broke."

"I'm glad you did," Eden says. Doesn't mean she won't keep an eye on him, since he decided to once, but it makes it a little less likely he'll try again anytime soon. At least, she hopes it does, but he's already been uprooted from whatever he may have been holding onto. It's a wonder, she thinks, most people don't try that route here, thinking it'll take them home. "Dying's no more fun than the rest of it. You can stay here a while if you want. I'll show you around the place when you're feeling a little more up to it." With the shape he's in, there's no good that can come of pushing him. That kind of hurt isn't just about injuries sustained, bruises and falls; it goes a lot deeper than that.

"I'm alright," Elvis tells her, though he isn't sure just how much he means it. Physically speaking, at least, he's fine, a little worse for wear but nothing of real consequence; it's everything else that's the problem, and everything else he doesn't want to talk about. He's practically back where he started, he's just now also a long, long way from home, and it's hard to tell just yet whether that makes it better or worse. Either way, none of that makes him incapable of learning his way around, and he might as well do so sooner rather than later. (He wants to ask what she knows about dying, if she did so herself or if she's just making a guess, but despite what she knows about him just by nature of the way he arrived, it doesn't feel like his place.) "Doesn't feel great, but I don't expect that to change."

"You'd be surprised," Eden says. She gets to her feet then, holding one out to him. "Come on. I'll give you the grand tour. You got a name?" He probably does — most people do, some have a few — but god only knows around here. The main thing, she thinks, is to take it slow, keep him as at ease as possible, which isn't, she suspects, much right now. Whatever he's been through to get him here, even if he changed his mind, he isn't likely to be too happy about the sudden change. She doesn't want to baby him either, though; that's just not her style, and it won't help him any if she coddles him. If anything, he feels hopeless enough without her going soft on him.

"Sure do," Elvis answers, mumbling a quick thanks a moment later as he takes her offered hand to help pull himself to his feet, wincing just slightly as he does. Nothing feels particularly good, especially not with his heart still beating a little too fast in his chest (at least it's beating at all), but he's intent on ignoring that, both because he did it to himself and because, all things considered, it isn't a big deal. Banged up though he may be, he isn't actually hurt, and he'd rather downplay the very fact of that than have her feel like she needs to take care of him or some shit like that. Just letting her show him around is more than he really wants to accept; it just also happens to be the only option he's got. "Elvis Moreau." He hopes, God, he hopes that she hasn't heard of him, in light of all the recent media. That would be just his luck.

"Like Presley," Eden says, then rolls her eyes at herself, dusting her hands off as she walks away in search of shoes to wear out. "You probably hear that way too much, sorry. Nice to meet you, Elvis." The circumstances are awful, but she believes in being kind and open to new people, and that includes strangers dropping right from her ceiling at the worst of times. After a moment, she hesitates, then doubles back; instead of opening the door, she goes to drag a chair under the rope, nudging the remains of his away before stepping up to try and undo the way it's tied to the exposed beam there. It isn't too easy, when it's tied on good and tight, but she's intent on finishing this before they head out. "Sorry. Got a teenage girl I take care of and she might panic a little if she comes back to this and no explanation."

"No, it's fine. I'm not in a rush," Elvis says, shifting his weight uncomfortably for a moment before he steps back to lean against a wall, for lack of anything better to do. Watching her take care of this, clean up everything left by his near-suicide attempt that almost killed him anyway, it's more than a little unsettling, but it's too late to offer to do it instead, even if she shouldn't have to; he's not sure it would be an especially good idea, anyway, him on a chair under the rope he just tried to hang himself with. He wouldn't try anything, he knows better than that, but if he were the one in her position, he doubts he'd trust himself to do it. Doubling back to her first comment is mostly to give himself something else to focus on as she works, the one time he thinks the subject of his name might actually be preferable. "Yeah, I get it a lot. S'alright, most people just don't think of anything else."

"Well, it's not a very common one," Eden says, willing to focus on that instead as she tugs at the stubborn knot. It doesn't seem inclined to come loose, and given that he must have had nearly his whole weight on it for a few moments there, she can't really be surprised, but she wishes for both their sakes it were a faster job or that she had a knife around the house she could use to cut it down. "Your parents fans of his music or something, or they just like the sound of it?" With a little sound of triumph, she works it free, and not a moment too soon, because she's pretty sure if she keeps it up much longer, she'll fall right down. That's the problem with being so short; even the chair doesn't really seem like enough sometimes. Pulling it loose, she settles back onto flat feet with a sigh.

"The former," Elvis answers, practically like it's a ritual, though the short laugh that would typically accompany the words dies in his throat before he can even attempt to get it out, and that's not the result of the way his throat still aches. His father's gone now, and he nearly was too, taking a page out of his mother's book (at least he wouldn't have been leaving anyone behind. Anabelle — it's hard to know what she'd have thought, if she would have cared. Her sunflowers were a miracle, but while they were enough to bring him back, they don't mean that he'd have gotten a second chance with her). Not particularly inclined to talk about either of them, he lifts his shoulders, what's nearly a protective gesture. He's pretty sure there's no one born after the mid-Fifties named Elvis who didn't get it from the singer, but he likes, at least, that Eden doesn't just assume, or cut right to making jokes about it. It's the rope he's referring to, though, when he says, "Uh, thanks for that."

Names come from all kinds of places, Eden knows that. The one she wears now, she chose for herself; the other came from a mother she doesn't even remember. It's a ragged thing she takes out only on special occasions, something that belongs to someone else, and if there's a reason why she was called that, she doesn't know what it is. With this one now, everyone just assumes her parents were especially religious, but the ones she remembers weren't.

Stepping down from the chair, she nudges the broken one on the ground toward the wall, pushing it back with a leg and dropping the rope atop it. "You're welcome," she says, turning back to him, dusting off her hands. She did it for Claire as much as for him. There's no need to dwell on it. "Shall we?"

"Might as well," Elvis says, shrugging, noncommittal. There's nothing to be gained from sticking around here, after all, when he still has this supposed island to see, and he really isn't sure he'd want to be here whenever this teenage girl she's taking care of gets back. It's probably obvious enough what happened without him having to explain himself, something he doesn't think he's ready for. Already he doesn't know what he'll say to anyone who asks, when he expects he'll be wearing the signs of what he nearly did for days to come; if he can put doing so off at all, he means to. "Lead the way."

It's a conversation she might have with him when she knows him a little better, or when a bit more time has passed — give him a little while before she suggests he talks. Actually, Eden's not sure he should be talking much yet, but she knows if he won't see a doctor, he's not going to talk to a professional and he probably won't talk to a stranger either. She'll make sure, before they part ways, once she's helped him get settled in, that he knows he can talk to her anyway. First, though, there's a lot to show him, and she opens the door to usher him outside, squinting in the sudden sunshine. She's a little bit off the path, though it's visible from here, the stream winding along behind the house, and the view, she's pretty sure, is about all the convincing most people need, although thank god, he's taking this in stride right enough. "Here we are," she says. "This bit around here, up the path, is called the Hidden Hamlet. Kind of a community within a community. There's only a few hundred of us total on the whole island."