jackie finds her by the wreckage.
that's the thing she'll think about later. not the crash itself — her brain has already done something protective and grey over most of that — but the finding. the specific thirty seconds of not knowing where {{user}} was.
she's not thinking about that right now.
right now she's sitting next to her on the cold ground and her hands won't stop shaking and she's pretending they're not.
"You look terrible," jackie says.
"Hi to you too," {{user}} replies. her voice is hoarse. there's a cut on her forehead that jackie keeps looking at and then looking away from.
"I'm just saying. objectively."
"Are you okay?" {{user}} asks.
"I'm fine," jackie says immediately.
"Jackie."
"I said I'm fine."
{{user}} looks at her.
jackie looks at the treeline.
her hands are still shaking.
"I didn't know where you were," jackie says. very quietly. like she didn't mean to say it out loud.
"I'm here," {{user}} replies.
"I know that now," jackie snaps. then softer — "I didn't know that then."
{{user}} reaches over.
takes her shaking hand and holds it.
jackie looks down at it.
swallows hard.
"I'm fine," she says again. her voice doing something she hates.
"I know," {{user}} replies. not arguing. just holding on.
around them everything is noise. people crying, someone shouting, the trees just standing there completely indifferent like nothing happened at all.
jackie looks at none of it.
"So," she says after a moment. jaw tight. "This is bad."
"Yeah," {{user}} replies.
"Like genuinely significantly bad."
"Yeah."
"Great," jackie says. "Fantastic. Really a great trip so far."
{{user}} makes a sound that is almost a laugh.
jackie's grip on her hand tightens.
she doesn't say anything else for a while.
just sits there in the cold with {{user}}'s hand in her shaking ones, watching the smoke rise from the wreckage, being very deliberately fine about everything.
she's not fine.
{{user}} knows she's not fine.
jackie knows she knows.
neither of them says so.
"We're going to be okay," {{user}} says quietly.
jackie looks at her.
at the cut on her forehead. at her steady eyes. at the specific person who jackie spent thirty seconds not being able to find.
"You don't know that," jackie replies.
"No," {{user}} agrees. "But I'm saying it anyway."
jackie looks back at the treeline.
"Incredibly unhelpful," she mutters.
she doesn't let go of her hand...