“You okay?” Cameron placed a hand on Violet’s elbow, surprised to find the shorter woman didn’t pull away. Violet didn’t answer though, she just stared into the horizon toward the park.

 Geauga Lake was once quite the attraction, so Violet had been told. She’d never seen the place while it was operational. Of course, Kacey had. A horrible shooting sensation zipped through her, as though guilt itself was exposing everything she never wanted to say about her previous marriage. Cameron squeezed Violet’s arm, an attempt to be comforting.



 “I haven’t been here in a while.” Violet finally spoke up, Cameron shook her head a bit and looked around the area before she responded.



 “That really doesn’t surprise me,” Particularly in the current state of things, it wouldn’t have surprised Cameron if no one came to this place for the rest of eternity. Tall grass had shriveled up and died in this open expanse of about half a mile to the fence of the abandoned amusement park. It could have been the fall air, or the lake breezes, the late afternoon setting sun, but something about this place was just off-putting. Creepy. “I can’t imagine many people want to hang out here.”



 “Kacey did,” Violet couldn’t help but smirk at that realization, looking around a bit more as she turned the thoughts over in her mind like coins from a foreign land. “She couldn’t stand horror movies, or games, or haunted houses. But find an abandoned building or park; she could walk around it for hours. Used to be that she would get us those winter passes to different parks just so we could walk around when there were only thirty or so people in ‘em. Wouldn’t see another soul for hours once we got going.”



 “And you enjoyed that?” Cameron grimaced, then quickly realized she probably sounded much more harsh than she should have. Violet chuckled.



 “Hell no, I hated it. I don’t like amusement parks when they’re full of people, and it’s way worse when there’s no one in them but you. It’s like being a little kid in the dark; you just don’t know what’s behind what corner.” Violet shuddered at the thought, shaking her head and crossing her arms over her waist. The memory of each and every park; the same steel statues erected over and over with the purpose of throwing people around. It was like being lost in a jungle on an alien planet, nothing had been more effective at making her lose any sense of grounding or direction she had.



 “Then why did you do it?” Cameron asked, peering over at the shorter woman and seeing that pensive look again. When Violet had crossed her arms, Cameron had the thought to simply return her hand to the strap of her backpack. Something inside her, however, was reluctant to cease contact. Her fingers smoothed up the soft skin and under the lining of Violet’s sleeve to gently grasp at her shoulder.

_ I’m here. I’m right here, with you._

“I dunno, she loved it. We always did what she wanted to do.”

“That’s shitty.” Cameron once again had responded without thinking, then internally kicked herself a bit again. She tentatively loosened her grip on Violet’s shoulder, expecting a shrug or at least a glare from her companion, but nothing came.

“Yeah,” Violet pursed her lips, and tightened her arms at her waist. She felt the hot pooling of tears trying to make their way to her eyes, but a preemptive clearing of her throat and a brief shift in balance pushed that sensation far back. “We should get walking, it’s going to be dark soon.”

“Right,” Cameron nodded, then the two began making their way toward the edge of the gate.

Once they reached the perimeter, Cameron had assumed they would need to attempt to scale it or something. Why? She had no idea, but it seemed like the right move to make. Perhaps she’d oversold the romanticism of it in her mind, scaling a fence to break into the abandoned amusement park was indeed something right out of a Nancy Drew or Goosebumps paperback. _Scooby-Doo head-ass shit. _Cameron thought as Violet pivoted to walk along the line of the fence. After about fifty yards, they came to a patch of concrete, it rested approximately ten feet from them when Violet stopped in her tracks and stared at it. In the center of the patch was an inlaid grate, some sort of storm drain, Cameron supposed. When Cameron looked to Violet for any further instruction, she saw an expression on her face that was somehow unfamiliar. She’d seen the woman cry, certainly, she’d seen her angry and frustrated, even the bitter smile and sardonic chuckles didn’t put her off anymore. She’d never seen Violet go so pale and truly uneasy though, and that concerned her.

“Take the photo,” Violet said after another long pause, then gestured toward the grate while looking away from it. “That’s where they found her body.”