Jade Fern Grove the seeds of love have taken hold and if we don't burn together, i'll burn alone

After seeing her best friend with another woman, Adeline kept walking. She doesn't know why it bothers her but it does. The thought that Grayday belongs to her never crossed her mind until that moment. Every promise he made to her, every gentle word, none of them matter anymore. He never meant a single thing and had only coaxed her along and toyed with her. He'd taken her from her family on the idea of a big adventure (did she even want to go?) and then he laid a claim instead of returning to Easthollow (did she even want to stay?), and in her absence her father died (she should have been there).

Over and over the thoughts roll back and forth and she's never given any answers. She doesn't know how to answer them for herself. Death follows her around every corner from the moment she'd been born but it is not her parents death she remembers. She still feels it after all this time.

If she stayed in the cuesta, someone would die too, but it would be too easy to give him such an out. He deserves whatever happens to him.

Her jaw tightens and she slowly comes to a stop. There's no direction in her movements and it takes several seconds to realize where she is. The grove is mostly unfamiliar to her in passing but she'd been traveling through it for miles before recognizing nothing around her. She sighs, her limbs tired and her mind weary as she become aware that her body needs more than she cares to offer it.