It had been handed her offhandedly, so innocuously that Sloane hadn't even thought to open it right away. She'd just tucked it under her pillow for later, waving off the apology that it had gotten mixed in with someone else's mail and they'd handed it over when they found it. Sloane had grown used to not getting a ton of mail, though things had trickled in here and there. She'd been busy, it was fine.

Opening the first letter, the one dated for the nineteenth, Sloane felt a little guilty for harboring some resentment over not hearing from those she thought were her closest friends. But she had up and left without telling most of them, so she'd grown used to the fact that it was her fault even if she wished for something, anything in acknowledgement.

That was of course, until she got to the second letter, the one Sisse had actually written first. Each line stole a little bit more of her breath away and she had to stop in the middle, folding it up neatly as she put on her shoes and headed out into the brewing storm clouds that had sent them in from the water early today. Slone had walked straight out of camp, through a little outcropping of forest and up a steep hike for what was probably close to half an hour. It felt like home now and she felt a little too numb and hollow to worry about anything lurking behind the leaves of the jungle.

It wasn't until she perched herself on the edge of the cliffs, watching the whitecaps of the surf bleed into the deepening sunset and rolling dark of the clouds that she dared to open the letter and finish reading it. Sisse was talking about Alvin at first. Her brother hadn't said anything to her, but a rift between them would have explained his dour mood in the days leading up to her departure. It was unexpected, but Sloane knew them both well enough to know that whatever happened wasn't any of her business really and they hopefully made the decisions that were best for them.

Well, apparently Sisse had.

It felt like a stab, sharp and hot right where she felt most vulnerable. Worse than what she did to herself when the nightmares wouldn't stay away. The whole thing was worse, some unforeseen, wild hallucination, a skew of reality. The end was hard to read, especially through the tears that had started to fall. She dug her nails into her palms, needing the bite of the pain, balling up the letter, letting the inevitability of it wash over her.

Too late and not enough. Never enough.

The worst part was that she only had herself to blame; insisting on going flying that day, losing a year to the accident. Not being brave enough to say anything or even really come to terms herself with what she was feeling. Running away when things got too hard. Any opportunity was gone and now she had to live with it. Whatever pieces of her broken life she'd managed to stitch back together shattered again, everything open and raw and the only thing she felt came out as a jagged scream into the first rumble of thunder from the towering clouds above her. She screamed into the wind unto her throat would no longer cooperate and the tears were too overwhelming. In a last ditch effort of frustration, the letter was tossed over the edge of the cliff and Sloane sunk back down to the rocks. There was no going home after this. She was going to have to beg, borrow and bribe her way into another expedition and another until everything faded from memory.

Nothing would ever be the same after this and it absolutely terrified her.