<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'">Gasoline whirred in the engine and the heat growled as it sputtered through the vents. The window was ice-cold against Reno's bare arm but she did not seek warmth, not from the noxious barely-functioning conditioning and not from the brooding spirit easing on the accelerator as if there was something worthwhile at the end of the road. Burning Bear flew by outside the frosted glass, what little it had to offer just a blur in the encroaching black. Rain billowed above the forest, kissing the mountaintops and dipping its cloud tendrils into the streets. Fog slipped through between brick buildings withering from the moisture, their own windows just barely aglow with copper, shadows of neighbors and acquaintances tending to their own lives. But their secrets and their shames seemed trivial in comparison to the burdens that skulked in the empty seat space between Volk and Reno. They had each brought their own blemishes to the graveyard and now they co-mingled, regrets and delinquencies and sins and bad blood all tangled up in one fucked up bridge that they should've burned years ago. <br/>
<br/>
The familiar roads and houses and quivering pines all looked foreign from the passenger seat. Without the tape deck playing she could fully hear the way the pistons roared and the clutch whined and the gears got caught. The truck, old enough to replace her father, ran well once, when someone actually cared for it. But it hadn't had an oil change in a year and the belts were wearing thin and the leather on the steering wheel had long peeled off, so it lurched and it fussed. Reno was used to driving it slow, cruising the backstreets, finding every long way home. Despite the cylinders sighing and the brakes squealing Reno had found solace in the torn flannel upholstery and the rabbit's foot hanging on the mirror- a token she had added herself. The two-door ancient pickup felt more like home these days than the house on the hill did, and at least here father wouldn't find her. She could meander up the pass into the thick of the wood, the same tape on repeat, loud and crackling through the busted speakers. She could park it on the turnpike that overlooked the city lights, embers in the pit, and drift. Sometimes she left it on, just to smell the exhaust, hear the low clamor of the motor in idle. It reminded her of her father's garage when it wasn't locked up, when the doors still opened. It belonged to the rats, now. <br/>
<br/>
The rabbit's foot swung on its golden cord, a pendulum at the will of Volk's too-fast turns. Reno didn't feel lucky now. <br/>
<br/>
Nausea came fast and intensely as they turned onto the lingering street, the one that belonged solely to Castle Gray. It was no longer a castle, or even an abode. Its paneling had been stripped in a patchwork fashion and the window shutters had splintered and rusted half-shut. The porch crumbled and the roof submitted to the rain. The driveway had been washed out, the front yard overgrown and inhabited by dandelions, which Reno had admittedly grown quite fond of. The detached garage, the old shop, lay like a ruin, a monument to what used to be. Tire tread had encroached on the weeds near the shed, the same space the truck had always been parked. It never belonged in the garage- that was reserved for Volk's and dad's latest project, and for mother's car, a sleek sedan with chrome rims and headlights that didn't flutter and dim whenever the radio was on. Nobody knew what was in the shop, now. More loose ends, more unfulfilled promises. <br/>
<br/>
This macabre crypt was, whatever the circumstance, still home to Reno. She had lived here since birth. Her height marks still varnished the archway, the dent where her shoes had found the wall in adolescent fury still marred the hallway, the stain where mother had spilled her wine in the master suite still scarred the old floral rug, the passed childhood pets were still buried under makeshift headstones in the far corner of the backyard. All the traces of <i>before </i>that Reno couldn't hide away in the attic still remained, and they haunted her. She had done her best to expel the interior of anything that brought her back- the baby and family photos above the staircase had been torn down, the quilts that mother had sewed had been discarded, the home videos stacked on top of the VCR had been removed, the mailbox sign displaying their last name had been painted over, the stupid drawings Volk and Reno had sketched together had long been tossed. The house was a husk, completely void of any suggestion that somebody lived there. The only place there was a hint of humanity was Reno's bedroom, the tiny upstairs hideaway with the silled window that overlooked the woods in the back. Though she had tried to purge any remnants of her kiddishness, mementos still remained. The stuffed tiger, fur matted and black eyes held on by thin threads. The wildflowers she had picked, dried and hanging from twine. The collection of pretty rocks she had collected, displayed in a glass box on the dresser beside clothes much too mature for her. It was sanctuary in a place she felt unwelcome, the lilac walls and the scarves hanging from the ceiling. Even the crystal chandelier that once hung in the dining room had been uprooted and now dangled above her pillows. This was the only part of the house that mattered- every other room was useless and rightful territory of the dust bunnies. <br/>
<br/>
She wondered if it would surprise Volk to find his own childhood dwelling picked apart until only the bones remained. The furniture too heavy for her to move herself were the only objects that held their ground. There was no dad, no mom, no Volk, no family, nothing here. Just a giant wooden corpse laden with holes where pictures once hung and echoing closets where the clothing of the dead used to sit.  <br/>
<br/>
<i>Beautiful</i>...<br/>
<br/>
It sounded like bullshit. Pretend affection crawling out of his maw that would eat her up, finish her off if given the chance. There was nothing beautiful about a graveyard girl, princess of a dead keep and a dead name, ghost unable to move on. This wasn't even tragic beauty. It was just a fucking tragedy. <br/>
<br/>
The truck exhaled in park and seemed relieved to finally be off. The clock on the dash read eight o'clock and Reno's heart sunk. Nobody had turned into a pumpkin. Volk was just peering at her, pestering her with his knocks against the steel, utterly oblivious to the fact that he was not through seeing graves for today. This whole cursed plot of damn land was a giant miserable grave and she was part of it. <br/>
<br/>
Grinding metal sang, somehow more melodious than the creaking of the house, as Reno cranked the door open. The tears had created a web of exhaustion in her face and she struggled to stand upright, the wind in her chest knocked completely out of her.<br/>
<br/>
"You can't live here, Volk. Not when even I barely do." She wasn't trying to dissuade him from staying, or insult him- it sounded like a genuine warning, as if he were about to enter the abyss. This was not the familiar hearth that he kept, a relic, in the back of his mind. "You don't understand."<br/>
<br/>
She began the trek across the lawn to the front door, which stood, a looming beacon, with cold beckoning welcome. "You don't understand, you really don't understand," her ankles wobbled, aching from the heels that supported them. <br/>
<br/>
"There's nothing here." </span>