Cyrus

2 | Meaningless

"Aiden? Do you really love me?" Kylie asked.

"I do." I answered, nearly without hesitation, thinking as though I was stating the obvious. "Why even ask that?"

Kylie suddenly stopped, letting the swift breeze flow through her dark hair. "I'm sick of hiding. Everything is getting in our way, and I'm afraid that one of these days, something will stop us from ever seeing each other again." Kylie took both of my hands and stood on the tips of her toes, putting her at eye level with me. "So, I started thinking about some stuff."

"We'l--"

"I was thinking about it all day after we went home." Kylie spoke softly. "Let's run away again, as far as we can from this place. Depending on where we go, we can get married in a year, and it'll just be the both of us. We can disappear and start over, we can be anyone and anything. Can't we just see where this wind takes us?"

She was right. We could go to any place and blend in like two normal people, and we could start fresh. Nothing she had spoken of sounded wrong. It was as simple as packing our bags in the darkness of the night and leaving, running wherever we may, wherever fate would place us. I was so blinded by my love for Kylie that I hadn't seen the many flaws in her logic. It was so flawed, yet it seemed so brilliant in my young teenaged mind. Even after our previous attempt had ended in many broken bones for me.

"You're right. We can leave this place, and never have anything to do with it again." I trailed off, still slightly shaken from the suddenness of the topic she had decided to bring up. "I'm going to go wherever you go. If you run, I run. If you decide to stay here, I'll stay. But the one thing I'm not going to do is leave you alone."

Her face began to gleam like the Northern Lights, shining bright with the excitement of hearing those few words, words she had so badly wanted to hear. It was then that she threw herself into my chest. Kylie's slightly heavy breathing, the lifting and falling of her chest, they were connected with mine in the deepest sense, in the deepest possible way. I knew then, without doubt, that I had made the right choice on that night.

"But we have somewhere to go first, don't we?" Kylie inquired, sharing a coy smile.

+ + + + +

It only felt as though it were mere moments before we had reached our destination, the home of Kylie's older sister. We had barged in as if it had been our own home and ran straight for a bedroom that wasn't ours. With a shut door and the bright lights on, Kylie and I stood before each other with mixed emotions. Nervousness, excitement, happiness, and everything in between filled the bedroom with an odd, opulent atmosphere.

"Sh...Should I go first?" I asked, almost as clueless as she was.

Kylie shook her head softly and took a step closer to me before looking at her clothes. "I want you to take them off."

Shakily, I nodded my acceptance. My hands, trembling with nervousness, reached outward towards the top buttons of her shirt. One by one, button by button, they came undone. As I finished the final button, she let her shirt fall to the clean, beige carpet that had rested beneath us. I exhaled the nerves I had collected in my throat and continued downward.

My hands traced the inner curve of her flat stomach and followed the bend of her waist, until they met the band of her leggings. Momentarily, I paused with the scent of lilies barraging my nostrils. I exhaled quietly, and in one fell swoop, her leggings had met her ankles. Kylie stepped out of them and stumbled back onto the bed that rested behind her, now wearing only a bra and a single pair of violet silk panties. Her body, her silken skin, and even the fragrance that poured off of her were all perfect. That feeling only grew stronger as her bra was tossed to the floor.

I wouldn't have changed anything at that moment. Not me, not Kylie, nothing at all.

"You have one more to go." Kylie, albeit shyly, managed to pull out a smile from behind blatant nervousness.

I took a short, almost sheepish stride forward.

"Take them off." she urged me.

Throwing any caution I had left to the wind, I ripped off my shirt and followed Kylie to the bed. She fell back, legs splayed, allowing me to hover over what suddenly felt like a small, exquisitely defenseless body. With all of my weight on my knees, my fingers caught the smooth fabric that was stretched around her waist. Down they went, as quick as an imploding building.

Clothes were shed and we soon found ourselves under covers, exploring entirely uncharted territory. Slight pain, excitement, lust, nervousness, embarrassment - a little of everything had been felt between us. Love, however, had been the one thing we felt all through the night, just until the wee hours of the morning. We hadn't once left that seemingly magic-inflated bed, and continued to fall into a deep, fulfilled slumber.

+ + + + +

It must have been early in the afternoon, as the sun had been blasting through the window, uncaring of my grogginess. That wasn't what had awoken me, however. It was the sound of loud whispering that had done the job. The loud whispering soon turned into normal voices, and then further turned into quiet yelling. Though quiet, it was intense; and quite obviously an argument of some sort. Who was Kylie arguing with?

My question, with posthaste, was answered by an opened door. Instead of Kylie, I was greeted by another woman. Clad in a loose black tank top and skin-tight jeans, this woman was Kylie's eighteen year old sister, Maggie - the owner of the home we had broken into.

"Hey, Romeo." Maggie nearly snarled. "Juliet out here already fessed up to everything."

Maggie further stepped into the room, punching the door shut behind her. It was naught but mere seconds, but at that moment, those mere seconds felt like an eternity and a half. While she didn't look angry, she also didn't look supportive, either. She was the one person I could never get a read on at all, nor did she have any indication of letting me leave. There was, indeed, a metaphorical gun pointed at my head and it wasn't moving until she was done with me.

"Yeah, I sponged everything out of her. You taking her v-card, and even your plans to elope." Maggie brushed her bangs out of her face and gave a sigh. "I don't agree with my parents, nor do I want them in my life, but the only things those 'plans' will achieve is a bunch of police on your ass accusing you of kidnapping. So basically, bye Kylie and hello juvy."

"I don't care. I'm going to follow Kylie, whether she decides to leave or not." I barely manged to squawk out a confident sounding reply. However, I wasn't going to budge, ever. My decision, my choice had been final. It was immovable.

"s**t, the lost puppy's balls actually dropped. Well, excuse the f**k out of me." Maggie sarcastically smirked. "Listen, if I knew that either my parents or your mom wouldn't come breaking my door down looking for you, I'd let you two stay here. But both you and I know that isn't going to happen. So, what then? If I'm not taking you two in, what are you going to do? Run away aimlessly with no plans, money, or even a car? Use your head, Cyrus."

Pulling my shirt over my head, I looked back up at Maggie. "I'll do whatever it takes to make Kylie happy, at any cost. Even if that cost is my life."

"No, no, no. You aren't getting it, stupid." Maggie shook her head, lightly pressing her palm into my forehead. "If you're going to run, then do it right. Get money, and make sure you both have a plan. Don't run around like damn chickens with your heads cut off."

Maggie turned and stepped up to the crystal-clear glass of the window. There was a mixed expression that rested on her face, one of sadness, thrown in a boiling pot with thought and even some anger. Her crystal-like blue eyes only slightly shivered, reflecting the afternoon light. Young and old, they thought the same, it appeared.

"I'm actually a little jealous of Kylie. It looks like she roped in a rare species of men." Maggie gave a near saddened giggle. "Genuine people like you don't even exist anymore, you're a breed that is quickly getting stomped out by people's self-preservation and gratification. None of my friends or any ex would jump in front of a bullet for me, not at the cost of their own life. Friendship, boyfriends and girlfriends, love. . .they're all just meaningless words that give a shallow symbol of hope to a hopeless human species."

Maggie turned around and stared me down, eye to eye. "That's all they are, what you're saying, what you claim to feel about Kylie - everything. They are just meaningless words. Actions, your actions are the only thing that can prove the meaning, the hope behind your words."

Maggie's eyelids fluttered as she stared downwards. Her intensity, her words were able to melt a metaphorical hole through me. I felt the truth in them. These were words that I would later live by as though they were The Ten Commandments.

"Make sure you do that for Kylie, otherwise I'll kill you with my bare hands."