by Bloodthirstybutcher » Fri Mar 19, 2021 5:59 pm
Part 22-"Ellen Rhodes Goes For A Midnight Stroll"
Day seventeen.
Maggie stared down at her bloodied and calloused bare feet as each one struggled to place itself in front of the other. She'd stopped looking ahead... the constant, unchanging stretch of land in front of her was far too depressing. There was less than a third of the way left to travel, but she couldn't possibly know that. Being so low to the ground obscured the buildings of Kern's Junction, far in the distance, from view. But one foot in front of the other, for now she could mentally handle that.
Three days had passed since they'd lost Sandra. The bean supply was dwindling and none of them had had a drop of water since before the train robbery, save what lied within the beans themselves. A cool breeze had been blowing through the valley that day, offering reprieve from the heat that most certainly would have killed them by now. There were even clouds in the sky, providing shade from the sun's harsh rays.
Connie was dragging the bean stretcher behind her, stumbling in the pebbles and trying not to fall from dizziness. Her head pounded with a migraine from the extreme dehydration. She was not going to let this goddamned desert beat her though. She was more determined than ever to make it to Kern's Junction. They'd simply come too far.
Ellen was less sure. In fact, she hadn't spoken a word since they left the boulder. She marched along further behind the other two and, like Maggie, was fixed on her foot placement in the jagged rocks. Her hands were clasped together as if she were maintaining reverence in church. Maggie had been keeping her eye on Ellen, getting deeply concerned about her mental state. Ellen was just too quiet, even for Ellen.
Maggie wordlessly gestured for Connie to say something to Ellen, to try and bring her out of her own head. She knew any kind gesture coming from Connie would mean the world to Ellen. Connie took one look at Ellen and understood.
"Hey, El... why don't you come walk up here next to me?"
Ellen didn't reply, or even lift her head. She just remained focused on the ground in front of her. Connie returned her gaze to Maggie, now feeling just as worried as she was about Ellen.
Another parade of horses and wagons roared past the tiny women that day. They were hauling sections of rail to replace the damaged portions of the line. Maggie and Connie yelled at the tops of their lungs to try and catch someone's attention, yet again to no avail. Ellen just stared at the ground, emotionless and tired.
Pressing forward was the only option. Pressing through the aching in their bones and the tiredness in their muscles. Pressing through the thirst... the unrelenting, gnawing thirst.
Growing nearer with each step was an enormous prickly pear cactus, large even at normal height, but a mass of skyscrapers in a city block from their perspective. Maggie and Connie stopped to admire it, both thinking about what Ellen had said weeks ago about not consuming cactus. That was before they were on the brink of death. Even adrift at sea, someone will eventually get thirsty enough to drink the sea water.
They waited for Ellen to catch up and presented the question to her.
"Ellen, honey... I know you said cactus could make us sick, but is there any chance?" Asked Connie.
Ellen looked up and down the gigantic plant with absolutely no emotion on her face. "Prickly pears are the least likely to make you ill... not that it really matters... we'd just be prolonging the inevitable... we're going to die anyway."
It wasn't what Ellen had said that sent a chill through Maggie's spine, she couldn't hear her response anyway. It was how little feeling Ellen seemed to have about it. Ellen thought they were going to die, and had quietly accepted it... even welcomed it. Her reluctance to join Connie was a red flag in and of itself.
Connie snatched another match from Maggie's pack, leaving just one left. She pulled the dagger from the strand of thread holding her poncho against her body and then took off down the embanked side of the wagon rut, climbing up the other side. The woman's energy and stamina astounded Maggie. Ellen simply continued to gaze at the ground. The prickly pear towered above Connie, some of its needles longer than her arm.
Connie set her glass dagger down and struck the match ablaze on a nearby rock in a single stroke. She held the tiny torch to a patch of needles at their bases, causing them to burn off and leaving an open and safe place to cut into the cactus' tough skin. She jammed the dagger into the green surface as hard as she could and used her body weight to drag it down, leaving a long cut in the plant. She repeated this until she had several manageable pieces cut from the cactus.
"What are you two waiting for?! Do I have to do everything myself?!" Connie snarked from across the duel valleys of the wagon road.
Maggie began to make her way down the steep side and then stopped when she saw Ellen hadn't moved.
"Come on, Ellen. We have to try?"
"Why?" Ellen replied, staring down at Maggie with the same cold, emotionless eyes as before.
Maggie easily made out the simple one word answer on Ellen's lips and pleaded with her, "because, if we die now... if we give up, then Greta and Sandra died for nothing. Greta saved my life, remember?! Fuck, YOU saved my life, El. I can't stop now, not even if I wanted to. Come on, we have to try..."
Despite Ellen's resolve to accept her fate, a single tear rolled down her cheek... and she reluctantly took Maggie's outstretched hand.
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The cactus proved to be a solid choice. It tasted awful and consuming it resulted in mildly upset stomachs for all of them, but they didn't vomit and they didn't get diarrhea. They didn't dare eat any more than necessary, not wanting to press their luck with getting sick. Maggie prayed its moisture would provide them with another day's travel... just one more day.
The tent was set up for the night. Maggie crawled up next to Connie on one side, but Ellen kept her distance. Connie hadn't realized how used she'd gotten to having Ellen pressed against her at night until then... and how much she wanted her there.
"C'mon, El... uh... better snuggle up tight... I'd hate for you to...," as much as she just wanted Ellen close to her, Connie's ego got in the way, "you never know when you'll run out of chances to feel my sweet ass agin' ya." She kicked herself the moment the words left her mouth.
"Why the fuck can't I just be real with her?" Connie thought to herself.
"El? Ellen?" She whispered. Ellen just rolled onto her side, turning her back to Connie. Connie turned her head back towards Maggie and mouthed the words, "what do we do?"
"I wish I knew," Maggie mouthed back.
The pair lay awake for quite a while after that, silently staring at the words backlit by moonlight on the walls of the tent. Maggie would pass out before Connie, neither aware of what Ellen had planned.
That is, until Connie awoke to a whisper in her ear...
"Cooooonnie... Coooonnie... wake up..."
Connie tried to adjust her eyes in the dark. She could barely make out Ellen's backlit shape as she leaned over her. One of Ellen's legs locked itself around Connie's waist and in one swift motion, she was straddling the confused redhead. Maggie barely stirred and rolled away at the touch of Ellen's leg.
"El... what... what the fuck are you doin'!" Connie asked, groggily.
Ellen placed her index finger on Connie's lips to silence her. She leaned down and whispered into Connie's ear.
"Please... Connie... I... I don't know how much time we have left. I'm tired... and I'm tired of hiding myself from you. Please... let me be with you... just once. Let me make you feel good... please... help me feel something."
Connie felt Ellen's fingers tracing past her breasts and down the length of her torso. The usually brash, loud mouthed, and cocky woman was suddenly speechless, quivering beneath her friend. Ellen leaned in and planted her lips on Connie's. There was no reaction at first, but then Ellen felt Connie's hand grip her hair and Connie returned Ellen's kiss... passionately. Ellen drew herself away from Connie's mouth eager to taste her neck... her shoulders... her breasts. The taste of dirt and sweat filled her mouth, but she didn't care... she finally had what she'd desired for so long.
Connie writhed under Ellen's touch. Ellen took her time making her way to Connie's sex, which drove Connie crazy with desire. It would seem Connie needed to feel something... something good as badly as Ellen did. When Ellen finally reached Connie's hungry mound, a moist spot had grown on the paper beneath her. She slowly worked a pair of fingers in and out while lapping at Connie's button. Even as Connie came, Ellen would give her no break. She just continued to tongue and thrust her digits inside of Connie, demanding orgasm after orgasm. Time no longer had meaning.
As Connie was left a writhing pool of jelly on the paper floor, Ellen climbed further up the redhead's body and positioned her own thirsty sex above Connie's face.
"Please... Connie... make me feel good... as if it's the last time."
"I've... I've... never done this to a woman befo-mmmm," Connie found herself cut off as Ellen's vagina smothered her mouth. Connie sucked and lapped and worked her tongue in and out as Ellen rode her face like she was breaking a horse. After her first orgasm in weeks, Ellen spun around on Connie's head and resumed work on Connie's sensitive lady bits. She and Connie would continue to pleasure each other until neither had the energy left to continue.
Perhaps it wasn't the best idea to work each other into a sweat when every drop is so precious, but psychologically it was what both needed... release. The two of them panted and stared up at the large figures written in the roof of the paper tent.
"My... god... El...," Connie began, still trying to catch her breath, "I guess what they say about you is true." She chuckled to herself a little. "Does this mean I'm in the club, too?"
Ellen shushed Connie with her finger again and then ran it up and down her moist, naked body. "Please, Connie... don't ruin this by saying something stupid and mean."
Ellen nuzzled against the redhead's skin, admiring the various places Connie's freckles had appeared on it over the years. She traced lines with her fingers between Connie's little moles and blemishes like connecting stars into constellations. She closed her eyes and wrapped her arms around Connie.
"Thank you, Connie. Thank you for one last moment of joy before it's all over. I don't expect you to understand... or even feel the same... just know that I love you, and I always will."
Connie felt a shiver run up her spine seeing the contented smile on Ellen's face after the somewhat ominous words she'd just spoken.
"Ellen, I love you too... but what the fuck are you talking about?"
For a third time, Ellen raised her finger to Connie's lips and shushed her.
"Just go to sleep, Connie... we'll see each other in the morning."
Connie found it hard to do so with Ellen's strange statement still rattling around in her head. What exactly did she mean by 'before it's all over'?
Maggie didn't stir until morning, remaining completely unaware of what had just transpired between Connie and Ellen. Hear weekend state, exhaustion, and deafness saw to that.
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The paper covering of the doorway flapped open in the morning breeze. The light flashing against the backs of Maggie's eyelids forced her awake. She opened her eyes to see Connie's giant face, still fast asleep. She pushed herself up as she wiped the sleep from her eyes. She felt hungry and desperately thirsty.
That's when she noticed Ellen was gone, her poncho still stacked in the corner with the others.
Maggie got up and nudged Connie to wake up. Connie just grunted and rolled onto her stomach. Maggie exited the tent, making sure to secure the entry flap so the wind would not carry it off. She looked around their camp site... no Ellen. Maggie called out to her... no response, not that she would have heard it anyway. There was a small rise near camp, not much more than an anthill to us, but a sizable hill to tiny Maggie. She began to scale it, hoping to get a better view of the surrounding area. She tried to suppress the growing panic in her chest as she climbed.
Ellen's behavior over the past few days had been worrisome, to say the least. Would she have just given up? Wandering off into the desert in an abandonment of hope?
A single rock sat at the top of the hill, at least a portion of it. It looked like there was much more buried beneath, perhaps the entire hill she was standing on. Behind the rock she could see Ellen's bare legs and feet stretched out in the dirt. It was a familiar scene, one she found herself in after the incident with the rattlesnake, only this time their roles were reversed. Maggie felt herself breath a sigh of relief, but then... the sight beyond, in the distance... were those... buildings?!
It was Kern's Junction alright. Two rows of false fronts on either side of the track. Branches of the railroad split off from the end near the round house to other mining towns in the surrounding mountains. Small shacks and tents were scattered around the main buildings. It was still quite a distance... but it was in sight.
Maggie rushed to the side of Ellen, her eyes nearly bulging out of her head, "Oh my god... OH MY GOD! Ellen! Ellen were almost there! Ellen...," Maggie turned her head towards her friend... and the joy she was feeling drained out of her very soul. She clasped the side sides of her head and screamed...
"CONNIEEEEEE!"
Connie snapped out of her sleep and sat up. Where were Ellen and Maggie?
"CONNIEEEEEEEEEE!"
Connie leapt to her feet and dashed out of the tent, not even bothering to grab her poncho. Something was wrong, she could feel it in her gut. Desperately, she scanned the area, until she could hear the direction Maggie's screams were coming from. She knew Maggie wouldn't be able to hear her if she replied.
"CONNIEEEEEEEE! PLEEEEEEASE!"
Connie darted up the hill in the direction of Maggie's screaming. She saw the rock protrusion... she saw Maggie kneeling on the ground sobbing... she was holding a bloodied hand in both of her own. Connie's heart raced. She didn't want to come any closer, but knew she must. She crept around the other side of the rock...
...and her heart broke.
Ellen was propped against the rock. Her eyes wide open... lifeless. Tears smeared the dirt on her face into trails beneath her eyes. Connie's glass dagger was lying next to Ellen's leg. Deep gashes were carved into Ellen's wrists. Pools of blood had collected under her hands and since dried and soaked into the dirt. Her skin... her skin was pale... almost blue.
Connie stood in silence. Her mouth hung agape, her stomach wrenched with more than just hunger and thirst. Her brain struggled to process the scene before her while Maggie screamed and bawled, still clutching Ellen's cold hand. Connie's attention was pulled away to see their Mecca in the distance, and then back to Ellen.
"It's there... it's right there... couldn't she see it? We're so close... Ellen... why?" Connie mumbled... mostly to herself, knowing Maggie was incapable of hearing anything she said.
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Ellen had left in the dark. She lightly kissed Connie's cheek and stroked the sleeping woman's hair one last time before picking up the dagger and walking naked into the cold night air. She felt her way towards the hill, where she'd made a mental decision the day before while Connie was setting up the tent to do what she intended to do. There were no lights to be seen coming from Kern's Junction so late at night... she didn't even know it was there. There was only moonlight and stars to see her off.
Ellen sat against the protruding rock with her legs out in front of her. She began crying
even before she ran the sharp edge of the glass across the first wrist. With the deed done, she dropped the dagger at her side and tilted her head back to watch the stars as her life slowly drained away. She had no idea what came after this life, but it couldn't be worse than suffering in this one and watching her friends die, one by one. She had lost her child... her husband... Greta... Sandra. She felt tired, and ready to go out on her terms.
She thought about her husband Tom, whom she still loved dearly... possibly somewhere waiting for her...
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Connie walked away for a moment, trying to control herself... trying to suppress the geyser of emotions about to explode in her. She turned back again to look into Ellen's sad, empty eyes... and came completely undone. She darted back to Ellen's body, sunk to her knees and began shaking the lifeless shell, in a mad, desperate attempt to undo what had been done.
"NO NO NO NO NO! WAAAAKE UUUUUP! YOU DON'T GET TO DO THIS! WAAAAAAKE UUUUUUP! NOT NOW... I NEED YOU!" Connie screamed as she slapped Ellen's face.
Maggie was barely holding it together, but was caught off guard by Connie's meltdown. She tried to take Connie's hand, "Oh god, Connie... I don't understand! Why'd she do it? Why'd she just give up?"
Connie's rage boiled over and she shoved Maggie away with such force that it sent her flying onto her backside. Maggie cried out in shock, "what the fuck, Connie?!"
Connie only glared at the tiny brunette and screamed, "don't you dare... don't you dare talk about her like that!"
Maggie shut her eyes and sobbed, throwing rocks in any direction she could out of frustration, screaming. She opened her eyes to see Connie, forehead to forehead with Ellen. She kissed Ellen's blue lips with the sort of gentle passion Maggie had no idea Connie was capable of. It became clear to her that something had happened between the two of them. Connie slumped so top of her head was beneath Ellen's chin and wailed and cried and clawed at Ellen's corpse.
Connie opened her tear filled eyes, realizing what she had just done to Maggie. She crawled across Ellen's lap towards the smaller woman. Maggie recoiled, thinking she was about to get attacked again only to have Connie lift her to her chest and hug her for all her life.
"I'm sorry... I'm sorry Maggie... please I'm so sorry... don't leave me, too. Please don't leave me, too... oh god... why?!"
Despite Connie's near crushing comparable strength, Maggie needed it as bad as Connie did. They held each other throughout the morning. Maggie eventually freed herself from Connie's embrace and closed Ellen's eyes with her hands. Connie could barely move, her legs feeling boneless and weak.
They had to bury her somehow. She'd be first of those who'd died to get that distinction. The ground was too hard to dig a hole even if they had something to dig with. All they could do is pile pebbles up, one by one on top of her. They decided that the hill top was as good a place as any. It was a lovely spot with views of the desert all around... not that they thought they'd ever get to return... just that Ellen might like it. She had chosen it after all.
Before the burial, they pulled her poncho over her head and then laid her flat on the ground, the outcropping serving as her headstone. It took several hours to complete the task, each of them walking up and down the hill to retrieve more stones, an arduous task even if they weren't already so weak. When done, a burial mound marked the last resting place of Ellen Rhodes, daughter of a mountain man and and a native woman, wife and mother to one.
Maggie and Connie reluctantly packed up camp and left the scene, hand in hand... weeping and broken.
End Part 22
Part 22-"Ellen Rhodes Goes For A Midnight Stroll"
Day seventeen.
Maggie stared down at her bloodied and calloused bare feet as each one struggled to place itself in front of the other. She'd stopped looking ahead... the constant, unchanging stretch of land in front of her was far too depressing. There was less than a third of the way left to travel, but she couldn't possibly know that. Being so low to the ground obscured the buildings of Kern's Junction, far in the distance, from view. But one foot in front of the other, for now she could mentally handle that.
Three days had passed since they'd lost Sandra. The bean supply was dwindling and none of them had had a drop of water since before the train robbery, save what lied within the beans themselves. A cool breeze had been blowing through the valley that day, offering reprieve from the heat that most certainly would have killed them by now. There were even clouds in the sky, providing shade from the sun's harsh rays.
Connie was dragging the bean stretcher behind her, stumbling in the pebbles and trying not to fall from dizziness. Her head pounded with a migraine from the extreme dehydration. She was not going to let this goddamned desert beat her though. She was more determined than ever to make it to Kern's Junction. They'd simply come too far.
Ellen was less sure. In fact, she hadn't spoken a word since they left the boulder. She marched along further behind the other two and, like Maggie, was fixed on her foot placement in the jagged rocks. Her hands were clasped together as if she were maintaining reverence in church. Maggie had been keeping her eye on Ellen, getting deeply concerned about her mental state. Ellen was just too quiet, even for Ellen.
Maggie wordlessly gestured for Connie to say something to Ellen, to try and bring her out of her own head. She knew any kind gesture coming from Connie would mean the world to Ellen. Connie took one look at Ellen and understood.
"Hey, El... why don't you come walk up here next to me?"
Ellen didn't reply, or even lift her head. She just remained focused on the ground in front of her. Connie returned her gaze to Maggie, now feeling just as worried as she was about Ellen.
Another parade of horses and wagons roared past the tiny women that day. They were hauling sections of rail to replace the damaged portions of the line. Maggie and Connie yelled at the tops of their lungs to try and catch someone's attention, yet again to no avail. Ellen just stared at the ground, emotionless and tired.
Pressing forward was the only option. Pressing through the aching in their bones and the tiredness in their muscles. Pressing through the thirst... the unrelenting, gnawing thirst.
Growing nearer with each step was an enormous prickly pear cactus, large even at normal height, but a mass of skyscrapers in a city block from their perspective. Maggie and Connie stopped to admire it, both thinking about what Ellen had said weeks ago about not consuming cactus. That was before they were on the brink of death. Even adrift at sea, someone will eventually get thirsty enough to drink the sea water.
They waited for Ellen to catch up and presented the question to her.
"Ellen, honey... I know you said cactus could make us sick, but is there any chance?" Asked Connie.
Ellen looked up and down the gigantic plant with absolutely no emotion on her face. "Prickly pears are the least likely to make you ill... not that it really matters... we'd just be prolonging the inevitable... we're going to die anyway."
It wasn't what Ellen had said that sent a chill through Maggie's spine, she couldn't hear her response anyway. It was how little feeling Ellen seemed to have about it. Ellen thought they were going to die, and had quietly accepted it... even welcomed it. Her reluctance to join Connie was a red flag in and of itself.
Connie snatched another match from Maggie's pack, leaving just one left. She pulled the dagger from the strand of thread holding her poncho against her body and then took off down the embanked side of the wagon rut, climbing up the other side. The woman's energy and stamina astounded Maggie. Ellen simply continued to gaze at the ground. The prickly pear towered above Connie, some of its needles longer than her arm.
Connie set her glass dagger down and struck the match ablaze on a nearby rock in a single stroke. She held the tiny torch to a patch of needles at their bases, causing them to burn off and leaving an open and safe place to cut into the cactus' tough skin. She jammed the dagger into the green surface as hard as she could and used her body weight to drag it down, leaving a long cut in the plant. She repeated this until she had several manageable pieces cut from the cactus.
"What are you two waiting for?! Do I have to do everything myself?!" Connie snarked from across the duel valleys of the wagon road.
Maggie began to make her way down the steep side and then stopped when she saw Ellen hadn't moved.
"Come on, Ellen. We have to try?"
"Why?" Ellen replied, staring down at Maggie with the same cold, emotionless eyes as before.
Maggie easily made out the simple one word answer on Ellen's lips and pleaded with her, "because, if we die now... if we give up, then Greta and Sandra died for nothing. Greta saved my life, remember?! Fuck, YOU saved my life, El. I can't stop now, not even if I wanted to. Come on, we have to try..."
Despite Ellen's resolve to accept her fate, a single tear rolled down her cheek... and she reluctantly took Maggie's outstretched hand.
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The cactus proved to be a solid choice. It tasted awful and consuming it resulted in mildly upset stomachs for all of them, but they didn't vomit and they didn't get diarrhea. They didn't dare eat any more than necessary, not wanting to press their luck with getting sick. Maggie prayed its moisture would provide them with another day's travel... just one more day.
The tent was set up for the night. Maggie crawled up next to Connie on one side, but Ellen kept her distance. Connie hadn't realized how used she'd gotten to having Ellen pressed against her at night until then... and how much she wanted her there.
"C'mon, El... uh... better snuggle up tight... I'd hate for you to...," as much as she just wanted Ellen close to her, Connie's ego got in the way, "you never know when you'll run out of chances to feel my sweet ass agin' ya." She kicked herself the moment the words left her mouth.
"Why the fuck can't I just be real with her?" Connie thought to herself.
"El? Ellen?" She whispered. Ellen just rolled onto her side, turning her back to Connie. Connie turned her head back towards Maggie and mouthed the words, "what do we do?"
"I wish I knew," Maggie mouthed back.
The pair lay awake for quite a while after that, silently staring at the words backlit by moonlight on the walls of the tent. Maggie would pass out before Connie, neither aware of what Ellen had planned.
That is, until Connie awoke to a whisper in her ear...
"Cooooonnie... Coooonnie... wake up..."
Connie tried to adjust her eyes in the dark. She could barely make out Ellen's backlit shape as she leaned over her. One of Ellen's legs locked itself around Connie's waist and in one swift motion, she was straddling the confused redhead. Maggie barely stirred and rolled away at the touch of Ellen's leg.
"El... what... what the fuck are you doin'!" Connie asked, groggily.
Ellen placed her index finger on Connie's lips to silence her. She leaned down and whispered into Connie's ear.
"Please... Connie... I... I don't know how much time we have left. I'm tired... and I'm tired of hiding myself from you. Please... let me be with you... just once. Let me make you feel good... please... help me feel something."
Connie felt Ellen's fingers tracing past her breasts and down the length of her torso. The usually brash, loud mouthed, and cocky woman was suddenly speechless, quivering beneath her friend. Ellen leaned in and planted her lips on Connie's. There was no reaction at first, but then Ellen felt Connie's hand grip her hair and Connie returned Ellen's kiss... passionately. Ellen drew herself away from Connie's mouth eager to taste her neck... her shoulders... her breasts. The taste of dirt and sweat filled her mouth, but she didn't care... she finally had what she'd desired for so long.
Connie writhed under Ellen's touch. Ellen took her time making her way to Connie's sex, which drove Connie crazy with desire. It would seem Connie needed to feel something... something good as badly as Ellen did. When Ellen finally reached Connie's hungry mound, a moist spot had grown on the paper beneath her. She slowly worked a pair of fingers in and out while lapping at Connie's button. Even as Connie came, Ellen would give her no break. She just continued to tongue and thrust her digits inside of Connie, demanding orgasm after orgasm. Time no longer had meaning.
As Connie was left a writhing pool of jelly on the paper floor, Ellen climbed further up the redhead's body and positioned her own thirsty sex above Connie's face.
"Please... Connie... make me feel good... as if it's the last time."
"I've... I've... never done this to a woman befo-mmmm," Connie found herself cut off as Ellen's vagina smothered her mouth. Connie sucked and lapped and worked her tongue in and out as Ellen rode her face like she was breaking a horse. After her first orgasm in weeks, Ellen spun around on Connie's head and resumed work on Connie's sensitive lady bits. She and Connie would continue to pleasure each other until neither had the energy left to continue.
Perhaps it wasn't the best idea to work each other into a sweat when every drop is so precious, but psychologically it was what both needed... release. The two of them panted and stared up at the large figures written in the roof of the paper tent.
"My... god... El...," Connie began, still trying to catch her breath, "I guess what they say about you is true." She chuckled to herself a little. "Does this mean I'm in the club, too?"
Ellen shushed Connie with her finger again and then ran it up and down her moist, naked body. "Please, Connie... don't ruin this by saying something stupid and mean."
Ellen nuzzled against the redhead's skin, admiring the various places Connie's freckles had appeared on it over the years. She traced lines with her fingers between Connie's little moles and blemishes like connecting stars into constellations. She closed her eyes and wrapped her arms around Connie.
"Thank you, Connie. Thank you for one last moment of joy before it's all over. I don't expect you to understand... or even feel the same... just know that I love you, and I always will."
Connie felt a shiver run up her spine seeing the contented smile on Ellen's face after the somewhat ominous words she'd just spoken.
"Ellen, I love you too... but what the fuck are you talking about?"
For a third time, Ellen raised her finger to Connie's lips and shushed her.
"Just go to sleep, Connie... we'll see each other in the morning."
Connie found it hard to do so with Ellen's strange statement still rattling around in her head. What exactly did she mean by 'before it's all over'?
Maggie didn't stir until morning, remaining completely unaware of what had just transpired between Connie and Ellen. Hear weekend state, exhaustion, and deafness saw to that.
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The paper covering of the doorway flapped open in the morning breeze. The light flashing against the backs of Maggie's eyelids forced her awake. She opened her eyes to see Connie's giant face, still fast asleep. She pushed herself up as she wiped the sleep from her eyes. She felt hungry and desperately thirsty.
That's when she noticed Ellen was gone, her poncho still stacked in the corner with the others.
Maggie got up and nudged Connie to wake up. Connie just grunted and rolled onto her stomach. Maggie exited the tent, making sure to secure the entry flap so the wind would not carry it off. She looked around their camp site... no Ellen. Maggie called out to her... no response, not that she would have heard it anyway. There was a small rise near camp, not much more than an anthill to us, but a sizable hill to tiny Maggie. She began to scale it, hoping to get a better view of the surrounding area. She tried to suppress the growing panic in her chest as she climbed.
Ellen's behavior over the past few days had been worrisome, to say the least. Would she have just given up? Wandering off into the desert in an abandonment of hope?
A single rock sat at the top of the hill, at least a portion of it. It looked like there was much more buried beneath, perhaps the entire hill she was standing on. Behind the rock she could see Ellen's bare legs and feet stretched out in the dirt. It was a familiar scene, one she found herself in after the incident with the rattlesnake, only this time their roles were reversed. Maggie felt herself breath a sigh of relief, but then... the sight beyond, in the distance... were those... buildings?!
It was Kern's Junction alright. Two rows of false fronts on either side of the track. Branches of the railroad split off from the end near the round house to other mining towns in the surrounding mountains. Small shacks and tents were scattered around the main buildings. It was still quite a distance... but it was in sight.
Maggie rushed to the side of Ellen, her eyes nearly bulging out of her head, "Oh my god... OH MY GOD! Ellen! Ellen were almost there! Ellen...," Maggie turned her head towards her friend... and the joy she was feeling drained out of her very soul. She clasped the side sides of her head and screamed...
"CONNIEEEEEE!"
Connie snapped out of her sleep and sat up. Where were Ellen and Maggie?
"CONNIEEEEEEEEEE!"
Connie leapt to her feet and dashed out of the tent, not even bothering to grab her poncho. Something was wrong, she could feel it in her gut. Desperately, she scanned the area, until she could hear the direction Maggie's screams were coming from. She knew Maggie wouldn't be able to hear her if she replied.
"CONNIEEEEEEEE! PLEEEEEEASE!"
Connie darted up the hill in the direction of Maggie's screaming. She saw the rock protrusion... she saw Maggie kneeling on the ground sobbing... she was holding a bloodied hand in both of her own. Connie's heart raced. She didn't want to come any closer, but knew she must. She crept around the other side of the rock...
...and her heart broke.
Ellen was propped against the rock. Her eyes wide open... lifeless. Tears smeared the dirt on her face into trails beneath her eyes. Connie's glass dagger was lying next to Ellen's leg. Deep gashes were carved into Ellen's wrists. Pools of blood had collected under her hands and since dried and soaked into the dirt. Her skin... her skin was pale... almost blue.
Connie stood in silence. Her mouth hung agape, her stomach wrenched with more than just hunger and thirst. Her brain struggled to process the scene before her while Maggie screamed and bawled, still clutching Ellen's cold hand. Connie's attention was pulled away to see their Mecca in the distance, and then back to Ellen.
"It's there... it's right there... couldn't she see it? We're so close... Ellen... why?" Connie mumbled... mostly to herself, knowing Maggie was incapable of hearing anything she said.
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Ellen had left in the dark. She lightly kissed Connie's cheek and stroked the sleeping woman's hair one last time before picking up the dagger and walking naked into the cold night air. She felt her way towards the hill, where she'd made a mental decision the day before while Connie was setting up the tent to do what she intended to do. There were no lights to be seen coming from Kern's Junction so late at night... she didn't even know it was there. There was only moonlight and stars to see her off.
Ellen sat against the protruding rock with her legs out in front of her. She began crying
even before she ran the sharp edge of the glass across the first wrist. With the deed done, she dropped the dagger at her side and tilted her head back to watch the stars as her life slowly drained away. She had no idea what came after this life, but it couldn't be worse than suffering in this one and watching her friends die, one by one. She had lost her child... her husband... Greta... Sandra. She felt tired, and ready to go out on her terms.
She thought about her husband Tom, whom she still loved dearly... possibly somewhere waiting for her...
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Connie walked away for a moment, trying to control herself... trying to suppress the geyser of emotions about to explode in her. She turned back again to look into Ellen's sad, empty eyes... and came completely undone. She darted back to Ellen's body, sunk to her knees and began shaking the lifeless shell, in a mad, desperate attempt to undo what had been done.
"NO NO NO NO NO! WAAAAKE UUUUUP! YOU DON'T GET TO DO THIS! WAAAAAAKE UUUUUUP! NOT NOW... I NEED YOU!" Connie screamed as she slapped Ellen's face.
Maggie was barely holding it together, but was caught off guard by Connie's meltdown. She tried to take Connie's hand, "Oh god, Connie... I don't understand! Why'd she do it? Why'd she just give up?"
Connie's rage boiled over and she shoved Maggie away with such force that it sent her flying onto her backside. Maggie cried out in shock, "what the fuck, Connie?!"
Connie only glared at the tiny brunette and screamed, "don't you dare... don't you dare talk about her like that!"
Maggie shut her eyes and sobbed, throwing rocks in any direction she could out of frustration, screaming. She opened her eyes to see Connie, forehead to forehead with Ellen. She kissed Ellen's blue lips with the sort of gentle passion Maggie had no idea Connie was capable of. It became clear to her that something had happened between the two of them. Connie slumped so top of her head was beneath Ellen's chin and wailed and cried and clawed at Ellen's corpse.
Connie opened her tear filled eyes, realizing what she had just done to Maggie. She crawled across Ellen's lap towards the smaller woman. Maggie recoiled, thinking she was about to get attacked again only to have Connie lift her to her chest and hug her for all her life.
"I'm sorry... I'm sorry Maggie... please I'm so sorry... don't leave me, too. Please don't leave me, too... oh god... why?!"
Despite Connie's near crushing comparable strength, Maggie needed it as bad as Connie did. They held each other throughout the morning. Maggie eventually freed herself from Connie's embrace and closed Ellen's eyes with her hands. Connie could barely move, her legs feeling boneless and weak.
They had to bury her somehow. She'd be first of those who'd died to get that distinction. The ground was too hard to dig a hole even if they had something to dig with. All they could do is pile pebbles up, one by one on top of her. They decided that the hill top was as good a place as any. It was a lovely spot with views of the desert all around... not that they thought they'd ever get to return... just that Ellen might like it. She had chosen it after all.
Before the burial, they pulled her poncho over her head and then laid her flat on the ground, the outcropping serving as her headstone. It took several hours to complete the task, each of them walking up and down the hill to retrieve more stones, an arduous task even if they weren't already so weak. When done, a burial mound marked the last resting place of Ellen Rhodes, daughter of a mountain man and and a native woman, wife and mother to one.
Maggie and Connie reluctantly packed up camp and left the scene, hand in hand... weeping and broken.
End Part 22