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Nat Scatorccio is fucking freezing.
Lakewater stabs her with icicle needles, inside and out. She could barely breathe when Travis pulled her out of the water, and she still gasps for breath. She's not sure she stayed conscious on the trek back to the cabin, but she must have. She made it, after all.
Nat has never been this cold before in her entire life, not even when Travis stayed out past sunset, too stupid to give up hope, and she stayed out with him, too stupid to give up on him.
She may not have given up on Travis, but Nat gave up on everything else. At least she thought she did, but all it took was one fucking albino moose to squeeze out another drop.
More painful than the chill in her veins is the shame. It was right there. Enough food to feed all of them through the rest of the winter, enough meat to ensure they won’t ever have to resort to—that—again. A frozen meal that could be defrosted without any guilt.
But it slipped through her fucking fingers, just like every other good thing in her life, because Natalie Scatorccio can’t do something, anything at all, without fucking it up. Mari was right. Her dad was right. She’s fucking useless, and now everyone is going to starve because of her. Starve, or worse. Nat's not sure how many more apologies she has left in her empty stomach.
Nat is so goddamn pathetic that even Shauna fucking Shipman, the third-trimester basket case, is taking pity on her.
“Come on, arms up.”
Nat obliges, and Shauna pulls the soaking wet undershirt off her shivering body, exposing her pale flesh to Shauna’s sullen gaze.
Nat has never been particularly modest, even before the crash. Four seasons in the Wiskayok High girls locker room made sure of that, and her parents'—her mom's—double-wide trailer boasted a full-size fridge but no fucking privacy. But what little privacy they had hoarded since the crash died in the first snowfall along with most of the edible vegetation. Shauna hasn’t bothered to close the bedroom door behind them, and Nat hasn’t complained.
(Nat lost her last scrap of dignity squatting over the pee bucket, when she made eye contact with a wide-eyed, humming Crystal. Nat can’t be sure, but she hasn’t shaken the suspicion that Crystal’s eyes started somewhere lower.)
Nat tugs her panties down her hips and Shauna unclasps her bra. The fabric clings needily to its deep red color, but already Nat sees it fading to pale pink. Shauna’s big, sad eyes trail over Nat’s body, and her expression nests somewhere between pity and hunger.
Nat has never much minded Shauna’s staring.
The rest of Nat’s clothes join her shirt and jackets in a heap on the floor. Shauna grabs Nat’s arm to keep one or both of them from floating away like a forgotten balloon, and Nat slowly lowers herself into the scalding hot water.
They don’t use the tub very often. It isn’t worth the time and effort to heat up enough water for everyone to bathe, especially now that everyone’s gone nose blind. They all reek, and splashing around a dead guy’s steel tub isn’t going to do much to change that now that there’s barely any soap left. (Gone are the days where Nat could freely raid suitcases for soap just to make blowing Travis slightly more pleasant.)
Nat doesn’t deserve the luxury of a hot bath, especially not as a fucked up consolation prize for failing at the one fucking thing she’s supposed to be good at. Yet Misty got to boiling water the moment they walked into the cabin, because apparently hot baths are “the number-one weapon in the battle against hypothermia!” (Misty started to say something else, something Nat is pretty sure was about Jackie, but Crystal tugged on her sleeve before she could say anything that would turn Shauna into a sobbing mess.)
The water burns Nat’s skin. It should feel good, relaxing, like the spa days that Lottie and Jackie used to talk about, the ones Nat could never afford. Instead, it just hurts. Nat is grateful for that, she doesn't deserve comfort. Not then, not now, and not ever. Not after what she did. (Especially not after what she didn’t do, what she didn’t stop.)
Nat melts into the tub and closes her eyes, trying to push all those thoughts away. Shauna pours another bucket of hot water into the tub, and steam fills the air. She places her hand on Nat’s bare shoulder.
“Are you okay, Nat?”
Shauna’s hand lingers, and her touch feels hotter than the water.
“I’m fine.” Nat answers with a voice frozen solid.
Shauna glances towards the door, as if she’s debating closing it. Before Nat can tell her it’s fine, it’s not like she has something they haven’t all seen already, Shauna shakes her head, like she's dismissing a suggestion from a voice Nat can't hear.
Shauna’s fingers slowly dip below the water, sliding down Nat’s body, across her flat stomach, and coming to rest on the soft bed of thick dark curls that match Nat’s roots, made darker by the water.
Nat freezes. “Shauna, what the fuck are you doing?”
Shauna stares at her with eyes like big brown fistfuls of cooked meat. “Shh, just let me do this for you.”
Nat’s mouth waters.
Shauna’s fingers move slowly at first, teasing Nat’s slit to draw out a throaty growl.
Shauna is hungry even now. Even with a belly full of not-food, she takes what she wants. She devours. She doesn’t give Nat the opportunity to protest, but it’s not like Nat ever would anyway.
Shauna is quickly becoming Nat’s only ally out here. Travis is falling under Lottie’s spell, Nat can feel it. Coach Ben is pretty much catatonic after what he saw them do. Even Tai, of all people, is starting to fall prey to Lottie’s Wicca shit.
If Lottie somehow comes back with food, then Nat is really fucked. Without any allies, or skills, she’s going to end up like—
Shauna’s fingers swirl around Nat’s clit with the deftness that only comes from actual experience. This isn’t a skill that Shauna has learned from getting herself off when she thinks that everyone else is asleep. No, Shauna has fucked girls before.
That realization fits all the pieces into place like putting a picked-over skeleton back in order. Nat really didn’t think Jackie had it in her, but everyone on the team has been full of surprises. Why should the dead be any different?
Is this even about Nat? Does Shauna actually care about Nat’s blatantly obvious misery? (Does she even care about Nat?) Or is this all just about Jackie, just like it always is with Shauna? Nat hates being proven wrong, but she can't deny that Jackie can make Nat jealous even from her metal mausoleum.
Everyone is just outside, fucking Travis is just outside. The door is wide open. Nat successfully stifles a moan when Shauna slips two fingers inside her. She’s less successful when Shauna crooks them and starts to thumb Nat’s clit faster and faster.
Shauna clasps her other hand over Nat’s mouth, and the room is silent except for subtle splashing of Shauna’s wrist against the water.
Nat hasn't cum in a long time, too long a time, the kind of time that even she, who knows when they crashed and Shauna's due date like she knows sunup and sundown, doesn't want to calculate. Sex with Travis has felt good, been a nice distraction, but he’s never actually gotten her there. (He’s certainly improved since their first time, when his scared little turtle wouldn’t even come out of its shell, but he’s still never been entirely successful.) She could self-induce, but there’s only one option unless she makes peace with the watchful eyes of everyone else in the cabin and, though she’s considered it, it’s way too cold to spend that kind of time in the outhouse.
It's been a while, and Nat tells herself that's why it doesn't take long for her to come undone under Shauna’s fingers.
Nat whimpers into Shauna’s palm, and Shauna shushes her without slowing down. Her thumb circles Nat’s clit as her fingers thrust faster and faster and faster.
“Fuck, Shauna—”
Nat lets out a low moan as Shauna breaks her open and pushes her over the edge.
If anyone heard her (who is she kidding, they almost certainly did), they must figure it’s none of their business.
Shauna stays still for a moment, before slowly pulling her hand away from Nat and out of the tub, wiping it on her sweater.
Nat finally starts to relax as Shauna pours the rest of the bucket into the tub.
“Hey, I’ll be right back, okay?”
Shauna Shipman is fucking freezing.
No, not Shauna Shipman—Shauna Sadecki. The name sounds wrong, even after ten months of marriage, but it’s hers and she needs to get used to it.
It’s not the first wrong thing she’s ever had to live with, or the wrongest.
The other survivors are probably overjoyed to take hot showers again, a welcome opportunity to return to normalcy, but Shauna isn’t. She hasn’t taken one since that day in Seattle, the first time a nurse turned the knob for her until steam rose like vapor breath in a meat shed, and she won’t take one now. She just can’t bring herself to grip the curved handle like a knife and twist it away from freezing cold.
Shauna doesn’t deserve warmth.
There’s a lot of things Shauna doesn’t deserve anymore.
She fucks Jeff often. She fucks other men. Women too, ones with hair too light and hair too dark, but never the right shade of honey blonde. (Once, a bleach blonde with eyes like sapphires set in soot who let Shauna pay for the privilege of wrapping a hand around her throat and squeezing. Shauna threw up afterwards: once and never again, just like the real thing.) She drowns herself with sex, but she never allows anyone to finish her off.
She doesn’t deserve warmth.
The only orgasms that Shauna allows herself now come from the cold, from numbing, stabbing pain. They bring her closer to the only person to ever make her cum from sex, the girl who died freezing and alone and who is now a part of Shauna forever.
Shauna doesn’t let herself think of that girl much, not anymore, but the shower is the one place where the dam of memories breaks, and she finds herself back in the wilderness, back in the cold, back in the meat shed, back with Ja—
She unhooks the showerhead and angles it between her legs.
Shauna yelps in pain as the icy jet stabs at her, a knife to the cunt.
This is the only way she lets herself get off anymore. It’s as close as she can bring herself to atonement, or penance. Penance for what she did, penance for who she is. Maybe this time it’ll be cold enough that she’ll fall asleep and never wake up, and go where she belongs.
Ice cold hands caress her body, ice cold fingers trail through the wiry, ungroomed thicket between her thighs, an ice cold tongue goes deeper and deeper inside her.
Shauna moans, or maybe it’s a sob, as the pulsing water aimed directly at her clit washes away the sin and the guilt, forming deserved tears in her eyes and undeserved heat in her core.
She feels Jackie, she feels Jackie in there with her, she feels Jackie’s frigid fingers and lips and tongue and teeth, devouring Shauna like Shauna devoured her.
Her cunt is starting to go numb, but the waves of pain and pleasure still radiate throughout her body. The water needles into her as the pressure builds and builds. With her free hand, she grips the shower curtain like a lover and lets out a strangled cry.
“Jackie—”
Maybe Jeff will hear her this time. Maybe Jeff will finally realize that his wife is a monster that devours everything in her path. A monster that killed Jackie a thousand times before she killed her for real, a monster that killed her one last time just for good measure. Maybe Jeff will finally see her for who she really is, and leave her all alone just like she deserves, all alone with no one to comfort her except for—
Shauna twists the knife handle in the moldy tile wall and the water shuts off.
That’s enough for today.
Shauna pulls back the curtain and steps out of the shower. Against all better judgment, she looks in the mirror. She’s too ashamed to look at her own naked body, aged by things that no twenty-four year old should have ever had to face, so instead she gazes through the steam and the fog, and looks over her mirrored bare shoulder.
For just a moment, big hazel eyes stare back at her, bright like that desolate winter morning.