[DRB]: Runaway
DATED: April 18th 1899 (2024)
It was tempting to claim that Filly’s entire life had changed in an instant.
But that wasn’t true. Not exactly.
The truth was, her life had changed in a series of collapsing dominoes — each with more impact than the last.
She thought her life changed that night in St. Denis, telling the others to leave without her. Taking out her knife to cut the officers free. They warned her she probably shouldn’t stick around, and she didn’t. She still remembered the sting of tears down her cheeks as she ran to the stables for a new horse. The way the cold bit at her skin as she fled far into the mountains.
Telegrams chased her from station to station.
“Where are you” her people asked, over and over. “We’re at the house,” they informed her. “Meet us there.” (She didn’t.) “I’m sorry”, they read. “But you don’t understand. It had to be done.”
“It’s safer when you don’t know. It can’t hurt you if you don’t know”.
“At least let us know you’re okay”, they pled.
…She camped in the woods that night, huddled next to what she could only assume had once been a house. They received no response.
By the morning, she had all but resolved to run away. Betrayal tainted the tip of her tongue.
She thought her life changed that day.
But by the end of the day, she was back at the house, clutching a telegram sent to her, signed earnestly with the words “Love, Dad”. He’d taken her in his arms. Chided her for making him worry all night but swore that it wasn’t going to happen like that again.
By dusk the others had gathered. It wasn’t long before a bank job was on the table, with her on the safe dials. Dials, bonds, chase. She refused to shoot. Glances passed around the room as they reluctantly allowed it.
Maybe, she’d thought as they barged through the doors, maybe if I do this well, my life will change. Maybe the debt will go down like they promised. Maybe, though she wasn’t so sure anymore.
But that was not the moment that her life changed.
The bank was a bust. They had to pick up and leave before even getting to look at the dials, fleeing into the countryside empty-handed.
The air had been frenetic, charged with an itch for something to happen. The bank falling through only left the others chomping at the bit for some other trouble to get into. They chased trains, prowled for civilians heavy on cash, but neither of these bore fruit.
When a telegram came from law, they all knew it was a trap. Between the hunger in their eyes and the warrants on their heads, there was no way that a meetup didn’t end in bloodshed.
So, she stepped away.
Filly refused.
And they let her.
They told her where to meet, and they let her go. Maybe, she thought as she rode away, maybe things really were changing.
She returned home. And waited.
And waited.
…And waited.
When Pike finally made it through the front door, alone, they both knew something was wrong. If the others had made it out, they would’ve been back by now. They’d be getting a telegram from one of them soon, they figured. Sent from Sisika.
But something about this time was different. Even without knowing what it was, they sat on the floor together in hushed contemplation. He passed her a cigarette, and she took it. For the first time, she didn’t cough.
Four friends they’d left behind, but when the telegram came, it wasn’t from any of them.
It was from a doctor. Dead, they said. Reagen Lynch is dead.
To say she’d been close with Reagen would be to miss the entire point. Rae had been many things. Brash. Abrasive too. Protective. Caring in her own way. Caring in the way a barbed wire fence cares for the livestock it contains. Caring in a way that would tear equally into the flesh of a hunting wolf and a runaway sheep.
“Complicated” barely scratched the surface of her relationship to the woman who had first put her in debt, and the group that woman had integrated her into by proxy. Not in life, and not in death.
The last officer standing had dropped her.
If either of them had been there, she might still be alive.
It could’ve been anyone that day, bleeding out in the dirt.
“Complicated” barely scratched the surface of her conflicting emotions as they made their way to the Rhodes hospital to retrieve her body. It barely even began to describe the mess of thoughts going through her head as her father pulled a mask over his face and warned her that the town was probably still swarming with the same law that had shot Rea down.
He pleaded with her that if they recognized him, if they came for his warrant, she had to stay with Rae so she could be buried. “Don’t fight them”, he made her promise. “If they come for me. Don’t fight.”
For the first time, it took effort say she wouldn’t shoot.
Even after Rae was buried, it took many more hours for the rest of the group to make it back home so they could all grieve over her freshly filled grave.
Despite everything Rae put her through, Filly shed tears. Retrieved one of Rea’s bandanas and put it on. Pulled the skull-patterned fabric over her nose to give her any amount of comfort.
With shuddering conviction, standing just feet from the grave, Pike wiped her debt. The weight of $450,000 owed died with Rea that day, setting Filly free.
“I love you”, he murmured. “I can’t hold her debt over you.”
“Please stay”, he meant. “Please just stay.”
Simple words and simple meanings that echoed in her mind all night. Compounding, complex guilt wrapped itself over her shoulders even as she shakily packed her bag, careful not to wake anyone.
By the morning light, everything had changed. Sunlight streamed in through the windows like the promise of a new day.
And Filly Maddison was gone.
[Next]