Survival Of The Fittest

God, what a dump.

[ Eli Sheridan: Start ]

As it always did, dust and asbestos permeated the air of the local Quik Stop, and as he generally had for the last two years, Eli coughed as he choked on the atmosphere walking through the door. He hated this place, but frankly, it was the only place that would sell him what he needed. He approached the counter. Joe was working Saturday, as he always did. That was good. He didn't even need to tell Joe why he was here.

"Lucky Strike?"

A terse nod. "If you got 'em."

He drummed his fingers nervously on the counter while Joe fetched the goods in question. It had been a rough week, relatively speaking. How rough, in fact, could be reliably measured. Normally, he had a couple cigarettes left when he came by the Quik Stop on Saturday. This week? He was out by Thursday. Between studying for midterms and fretting over layoffs that luckily never materialized, that cold turkey Friday was just the icing on the stress cake. He needed those Lucky Strikes now more than ever. Or at least more than usual. The five seconds it took to grab a pack of smokes and return to the counter with it seemed to drag on for hours to Eli.

"Seven seventy-five."

Having the price memorized was good for expediting matters. He had the exact change in hand coming through the door, and handed it over with all speed.

"Keep the change."

In a matter of seconds, he had his smokes in hand and was out the door, wasting no time to withdraw his lighter from his pocket. The pack was opened in the blink of an eye with expert precision, and the first cigarette almost jumped onto his lips. He leaned back against the wall outside the shop, and lit up. His eyelids tightened, his muscles relaxed, and his tongue took the Lord's name in vain, as that first drag practically brought him to orgasm. Two days without a smoke really did make it taste that much sweeter.

"Jesus Christ."

January in Seattle was miserable.

With the Christmas season dimming and people returning to their lives, the city reflected the sudden emptiness; the only lights still mounted belonging to those who could afford to forget about them, trees returned to their boxes now that they'd served their purpose, nary a smile or greeting from the once festive citizens. Cherry liked it better this way, to be honest. Christmas was depressing. She'd made the conscious effort not to celebrate it years ago, but every so often a pang of longing would worm it's way in.

She retreated into her jacket as a frigid wind passed through, leaving a pained expression on her rosy face in it's wake.

This was the life she knew and the one she was most comfortable with and wistful dreaming did little to console her. There was a time and a place for that kind of shit, but as for right now she had bigger things to concentrate on. Maybe when she got out of Rainier she'd fill up a bath tub full of wine and dream all the dreams, but until then it was business as usual.

Cherry took a sip out of the Mountain Dew bottle in her hand, warm euphoria washing over her body as the liquid burned down her throat and into the pit of her stomach. It had been awhile since she'd left Megan at the Maze, her buzz dying down significantly in Seattle's frigid cold. She felt a little guilty leaving her friend drunkenly stumbling through a maze, but it had to be done. Cherry wasn't anyone's babysitter, let alone a grown woman who bragged about drinking her brothers under the table. A stifled laugh escape her, sounding more like a cough than anything. Just the visual of a pissed of Megan beating at the walls of the maze was more than enough to make up for the scene she'd been causing all day.

And, if anything, Megan would probably find it just as funny. So no harm no foul.

Side stepping a particularly miserable looking pile of slush, Cherry rounded the bend towards the Quik-Stop. She passed it everyday to get home and immediately her pace quickened, wanting nothing more than to get home and out of the blistering cold. A satisfied smile curled on her lips, however, when she caught sight of a familiar mop of dirty blonde hair more or less making love to a cigarette outside the rinky-dink store.

"I have some Kleenex in my bag if you need 'em," She said as she approached Eli, wrapping her arms around herself when another chill wind jostled her, "Long time no see, Stranger."

The voice caught him off-guard, at first. Then, it wasn't the voice so much as what it said. For a moment, he wondered what he needed a Kleenex for. He took the cigarette from his lips to make room to wipe his nose. Dry. Well, if that wasn't it, he didn't care what she meant. He took another slow drag, then checked his watch. As technology marched on and cellphones reigned supreme, he was one of the last people in Seattle who still used a watch to tell the time, and probably still would if he could afford a cell in the first place.

"Gym class. Twenty-one hours, eighteen minutes ago," Eli replied in his usual Joe Friday deadpan. He glanced back at her, eyebrow cocked. "Depends on your standard for 'long'."

Dry response notwithstanding, Cherry was always a welcome distraction, as far as he was concerned. Were he given to romance, he'd have asked her out years ago. They would never last, but he'd have at least tried. Still, it struck him odd that she'd be out this way so early, knowing she had plans. There was an obvious explanation, though, and Occam's razor would suggest that that be the case. "Thought you were at the Castle with the others. How drunk was Megan this time?"

Cherry sighed, her own visible breath leaching into the cold air in perfect harmony with Eli's puffs. The acrid stench of cigarettes reminded her of home, like some kind of sick embrace. She inhaled deeply, letting the relics of smoke permeate her nostrils.  She'd never been a smoker, tried it once or twice at Leah's behest, but never really caught on to it. She didn't like how tight it made her lungs feel, like she couldn't move.  That's probably why she liked drinking so much, you felt so free and airy when you were drunk, like you could just take off from the ground at any second. And fuck knows it helped her forget about life in general for a few hours. Just enough to make it bearable.

Cherry took another swig from her bottle, barely reacting to the strong liquid as she crouched down against the wall, knees in arms.

"That's pretty good for someone who looks so damn dumb,"  She remarked with a small smile, rolling her head slightly to look up at Eli. If there was anyone in the world she could just… talk with, it was Eli Sheridan. She could insult him for days and he'd just fire one right back off and, honestly, he was probably the one person who could get away with saying shit like that to her.

"Drunk enough to cause a scene," She said, watching as a mother and child made their way into the small store, "I.e, drunk enough to make me want to leave."

Cherry wasn't one for scenes. They were nonsense and there was no reason for them. All you had to do was control your damn self and if you can't, well, no point in getting busted with you. People like Megan could get off with shit like that. Her? Not so much. She didn't have the type of prestige her family history or any of that shit to get her off the hook.

She briefly wondered how many families were sitting down for dinner, talking to one another about their days in that 50s manner that you always heard about, laughing and enjoying themselves. And yet here she was, sitting outside the Quik-Stop nourishing herself the only way she knew how, talking about her day with some equally fucked up kid. It was almost funny. Just two sinner indulging in their vices. Pretty fucked up family if you asked her. As if to drown the thoughts, she took another swig, nearly losing her balance in the process.

"Want some?" She asked, holding the bottle near Eli. She knew he'd say no, she knew why he'd say no, but she still asked.

Maybe she liked it when he lectured her.

He raised a hand to casually brush the offer aside. "That stuff's gonna be the death of you," he replied, the brazen irony of the smoke pouring from his nose as he said it not lost on him in the slightest.

Just this once, he spared her the trouble of the full rant. Perhaps it was because he liked her too much to lecture her, or perhaps he knew she would enjoy it if she did. Probably a little of both. He briefly considered slapping her across the eyes as well for even suggesting it when she knew what his father had done, but decided against it by the same reasoning. It really was that sort of friendship. Lovingly belligerent, he might describe it as, like the mating ritual of the Tasmanian devil. With less mating, of course. Those would not be healthy, well adjusted children by any means.

He opted to keep to his feet, back against the wall. It hadn't been long since he passed Cherry in height, and secretly, he cherished that one-inch advantage. He didn't like sacrificing that feeling of being taller than her after years of her playfully holding his things out of his reach, and standing over her now made him feel like a giant. The cigarette about halfway through, he ashed for the first time, to the side opposite where she sat, but letting the wind carry the castoff where it would.

"So, what brings you here?" His routine was like clockwork. Leave the apartment at one thirty on the nose, four minutes, thirty-eight seconds to walk to the Quik Stop. You could set your watch by it. There was no way she didn't expect him. "Obviously not a beer run. Just nothing better to do?"

((Leah Chapel))

Time to get another pack.

Leah was almost ashamed of her smoking habit by this point. Even if you initially don't have a problem with something you're doing, being forced to hide it from people eventually makes it feel wrong if you don't fight those thoughts. And Leah was in no mood to fight the thoughts or the addiction. Hence, another grudging trudge to the Quik Stop.

Two a day. She'd managed to get down from she-didn't-even-really-keep-track-of-how-many down to two a day. But that was as far as she could go. She knew her limits, and her willpower was just not going to be able to handle cutting out smoking entirely. Not when she could buy it this easily, not when the reminders of it lingered around the living room and soaked into the furniture. She only tried to quit because her dad made her; if she had any respect for the old man she might have tried harder. But it wasn't for his pleasure that she had "quit." She just wanted to avoid further conflict, to pass through the hall of their home silently and without friction until she could get to where she really wanted to be. Which wasn't exactly here, but it was close enough for the time being.

And, oh, Cherry and Eli were here. Eli as usual, Cherry as not. As soon as she spotted them, she called out from across the parking lot, approaching them as she continued.

"Hey Cherry. Why weren't you at work again? I forgot why, but one of the karts broke down. Some kid who thought he was a hotshot lost a race over it." A nod at Eli was enough to acknowledge his presence, given how ordinary it was. But Cherry needed to hear about the little bastard who thought the track was rigged just because his kart stopped running right. You only ever thought that if you never learned that shit happens, and that was a lesson she'd taken to heart.

((Start: Eliza Patton))

It hadn't been a very good winter. Or rather, winter wasn't very good at doing its job this far north, but then again it never did its job around the Sound very well.

It had only really snowed in two or three days out of the whole damn season. Every damn social media website was abuzz about gearing up for the Snowpocalypse like the Maya were 11 months early. But it never came, Los Angelenos were calling Seattleites "snowimps," and so on. Now there was just that January chill coming in from the Sound, and whatever piles of snow were left preserved by that chill looked like old foam-plastic props. And not normally having access to a computer, the almost-biker-looking girl walking up to the Quik Stop at least studiously avoided the internet and all its hype tied to the media machines.

But goddamn, winter was good while it lasted. Now in the months before spring it was all about staying warm, not just within her clothes but within her body as well, lungs be damned. Maybe the self-preservation instinct wasn't entirely there.

Anarchy, pain, and all kinds of wanton escapades notwithstanding, there was no denying that Eliza Patton at least possessed some form of self-preservation instinct. Her mini-mohawk was still very much intact, and her cheap jeans, snowboots and jacket made did the trick for keeping most of her outer biomass warm (save for where the cold found a conduit through her piercings), but winter hadn't quite banished from her innards just yet.

That was what friends were for. And to hell with Groundhog Day, spotting both her best friends just across a small parking lot from her - explaining why they weren't at the Go-Kart track just now - meant a smoky spring was close at hand.

"Hey ladies," she began as she stepped onto the sidewalk in front of the store next to the group. Two out of her three friends from the so-called Girls of Rainier Valley clique were chatting up the otherwise unassuming Eli Sheridan. "...and Eli. Am I interrupting something?"

She was already legal for buying cigs, but given the family finances and government taxes bumping the price of vice out of her reach, she often preferred to just mooch a couple sticks off her friends' packs. It was how Seattle-style anarchy worked - everyone gets what everyone gives and fuck the system on the side. There were no percentages when everyone was a Zero-Percenter. As it were.

Of course it wasn't that they were too busy. It was more along the lines of her receiving a text message on that cheap plastic thing she called her cellphone. Before they might have noticed her, she turned and left.

"Yeah...I'll come back later."