trigger warning: talk of mental illness and suicide

another short and important filler bc i can't just get on with the story lmao

"A man drove into a town on Friday and stayed there for three days, he left on Friday. How?"

Ophelia scoffed, "Easy, the horse's name was Friday."

"Okay I'm offended," Luna gasped dramatically, "That took me a while to figure out."

"Why?" she laughed. "It's really not that hard."

"To be fair I was 7," Luna smiled and Ophelia smiled along with her, a tinge of sadness surrounding her facial expression.

Ophelia had never really gotten over the fact that she was never there for Luna, she wanted to be, but she never had the chance.

She was happy that she got to have a relationship with her now, but she was also upset that her sister had to die for that to happen.

Luna noticed Ophelia's silence and came to the conclusion that she was thinking, so she put in her headphones and searched for a song to listen to.

At some point, Veronica started calling her so she answered the call.

"Luna?" Veronica called out loudly and she made a face.

"Ronnie? Why are you yelling?"

"Sorry, it's really loud in here! Can we FaceTime?"

"Sure," Luna laughed at Veronica.

She looked out the window while she waited for the incoming call.

Luna was admittedly scared, but she was also happy to be seeing her best friend.

What if she wasn't what she used to be?

What if she would never get better?

But worst of all, what if Luna was still in love with her?

She gulped at the thought and shook her head, no, she couldn't be.

That was a long time ago, and things were different now.

Luna remembered when she was 12 and she had asked if she could hang out with Lana for an hour or so when her mom had sighed and had to sit her down.

She learned that Ilana had gone to the hospital, and she was having a breakdown.

Her mother had caught her forcibly throwing up her food, where she admitted she'd been doing it for a while, and then her mom found the faint scars on her wrist.

Luna couldn't really remember a lot, only the major details, for it seemed so long ago yet it had only been 3 years.

She would never forget about her best friend, for they had been through so much together, and Ilana was the reason Luna had her first inclining she might not be straight.

She didn't want to believe it in the beginning, though.

Luna had to be straight, she had only had crushes on guys, and nm girls ever seemed interesting to her and she had made all these other excuses which proved to do nothing as years later she fell in love with a red-headed bitch.

Luna never considered suicide to be a choice, because was it really a choice if it was the only choice available?

Think about it this way, if you play a game and it gives you a choice you don't want to do, but the 'no' option is  $100, you're obviously not going to pay $100, so you really have no choice but to press the 'yes' button.

And in this case, the question was 'do you want to end your life?'.

Luna had her own fair share of problems with mental illness, and it only got worse when Anthony had died.

She had never truly found out why he died.

Yes, all signs pointed to something greater happened, but they could never really prove that Cheryl's dad had something to do with both the Jason and Anthony case.

Luna had never really talked to her friends or family about her mental issues because she was afraid.

But that was stupid, right? Being afraid.

That's like hiding you have the flue 'because you're afraid'. That doesn't really make any sense.

She wasn't even sure why she was afraid exactly, maybe she would be judged, maybe her friends wouldn't look at her the same way, and maybe they would say she was making it up or something.

Maybe they wouldn't want to associate with her anymore, and just exclude her completely.

Luna got anxiety just thinking about, so she shook her head to clear it as if it was an etch-a-sketch.

She suddenly looked at her phone and realized Veronica never FaceTimed her, she frowned, but she didn't call her back because she assumed something big had come up.

Luna looked out the window again, just in time to see the infamous town sign, but she frowned again when it had something different.

A few people were washing it, but Luna could tell that what once said 'the town with pep' now said 'the town with heroin'.

She shook her head and smiled as she passed the area where she had first met Archie, she stopped just in time to not kill him.

With Anthony by her side.

Everything had been much simpler when he was still alive.

Luna turned to Ophelia, "Are you ready to be back?"

"I'm always ready," Ophelia laughed, but it faltered when she slammed on the breaks.

Luna flew forwards but the seatbelt held her back, she sighed and looked up as she saw a tuft of red hair just above the windshield.

She scoffed, "I'm having a little deja vu."

***

again this is short but like ALL OF THESE ARE IMPORTANT FILLERS OKAY

anyways, yeah