Veronica held her breath as they turned down Riverchase. The passage in her throat constricted and released. Constrict, release. Constrict, release.

She tried to focus on the trees whipping by outside the window, tried to tell them apart and define them, rather than think of all the blood that still stained her mind.

A sob escaped again.

Keith's eyes were on her, worried. She could feel them, narrowing in on her tear-stained cheeks, the quiver of her lower lip. But if she looked up, if she succumbed to anything real, it was all over. And that would be bad.

Worse than… Her breath was coming in rapid, short pants.

She wasn't at all too sure how long it took them to get home – only that the next thing she found herself staring at was a blurry frame of her house, the lights dulled and dim, the paint faded and bleeding into one another.

There was a glance to her fingertips, as though she expected to find it there, gushing, pouring, cascading – staining her pep-squad uniform.

"Veronica … honey. We're home."

Her gaze yanked away and up, finding her father squatting in front of her open car door. She could see his tears, barely leaking, expression weary. With a choked noise, she flung herself at him, feeling her chest crack under the pressure building. His arms enfolded her, holding her close. Soothing rubs on her back and calming 'shhh's whispered against her hair.

It only made the tears feel hotter. Veronica tried to scream into his shoulder.

Keith lifted her, a foot kicking to close the car door, before he turned to take her inside.

"She's gone, she's gone…" She found herself sobbing into her mother's chest, foreign fingers lacing randomly through her hair. She could hear her dad's softened mutterings to Lianne, felt her mother's breath catch, and so caught her own.

All Veronica could think was that this was what the end of the world must've been like.