A/N: I literally don't know where this came from. I'm writing this on a whim at 2 in the morning, and thought the idea was pretty cool. More or less your skins twist on Alice in Wonderland. I give absolutely no promises as to when this gets updated because like I said, this came from nowhere. Let's call it my celebratory "I finished my first year of uni TODAY and I haven't died yet so let's write something" story.
Anyway I'd love to know if its worth continuing. If not, I might edit summary a bit and make it some small one shot of angst and affection. All up to you kiddies.

Double Disclaimer (skins and AIW)- nope andddddd nope.

Burning Roses

Ch 1

It started like every other Friday night she became accustomed to. Effy had stopped calling her mobile weeks ago because it was just implied that they were going to meet up. It became ritual to get wasted out of their fucking minds, maybe dabble in some drugs, and refuse to stir from their thick slumber until the sun began to wan the next day.

She doesn't even put up a fight at the brunette's seriously questionable choices. Doesn't even try to argue with the stubbornly annoying fire that she used to be known for, because that led to logic. Right fucking choices and she didn't have a damn clue what was right anymore. What was okay.

Her blonde hair was still upstanding, highly distinct, but it had lost its ferocity. Dimmed to at best a pale lemon tint. Lost, she supposed, around the same time she just gave in. Now she spends her time debating, at most, how much alcohol she's willing to handle before it will make a reappearance, probably twice, in the filthy toilets in the hall.

She doesn't think nor does she try anymore as she blindly feels on her closet floor for the dropped ensemble of clothes switched in and out every two weeks or so. It's kind of pathetic really, the lack of effort that goes into the preparation, no better than if she were throwing on a robe to fetch the mail. With an overdone, overly Effy sense of outlined eyes, completely void of seduction- merely intimidation- she's out the door of her now miscolored yellow house. So wrong, she thinks, at how much effort it takes to stand out. But she shakes her head and dispels the thought with a violent pull of her fag, earning her a deep throated cough. Shakes her head because that's how it goes now. She doesn't think.

She can't remember the last time she had an actual conversation with the lanky silent girl. The range of conversation as bleak as the color Effy wears on her clothes. No color. No spark. No talking. Just drinking.

And it helps for a bit she realizes. Because she no longer shakes her head and thinks of telling herself to stop thinking. It just happens. It's a bit of a relief because although she's been at it months, the vague Effy imitation of nonchalance and fuck all attitude, some deep inbred upbringing constantly nags at her to think. To brainstorm ideas and change things. To make a fucking difference. She knows its her mother nipping at the heels of her refusal to care, but the older blonde is washed away and scorched as another double shot of vodka sears its way down her throat, burning the words she wished she had the energy speak away. But it's too much for right now. Too much thinking. Too much to handle.

It's the most dangerous part of the night. Where she's lost the sobriety to keep herself in check yet she's not quite wasted enough for the night to blend into the next day. She's stuck in the unbearable in-between, thinking of not thinking and trying not care, then scolding herself for trying at all. Because it's how all these things start. The consideration of what might happen if she did try. If things did matter. If she had maybe smoked a fag instead of downing the vodka so the words shes kept harbored in the seams of her vocal cords might finally get dispelled. Maybe even with the excuse of hiding within the drugs she put in her system.

And she knows where these thoughts lead- to the rowdy bunch of misfits that should get along about zero percent but really fill in all of each others cracks and holes. Not one of them should get along, but they mesh like a unit. She doesn't know when it became a thing that the unit included her now since, back in the time when people couldn't get her to stop trying for change, she only ever shoved people who cared away. Looking back, none of it made sense- how she cared so much to make a difference but could hardly stand the thought of a talk with someone for more than five minutes without the burning need of alcohol to use as a crutch. Bloody boring, everyone seemed to be the same, so why bother, was her reasoning.

But she didn't account for a change in her system. That's probably why that one party, now seeming ages ago but really only a few weeks, fucked her up so quickly. She didn't account for burning roses to be found so fiercely in the hair of a girl she wouldn't have given a second glance at. But they were there, and her eyes were locked with an umber depth. Her system was, without a doubt, now null and void. She walked over, masking alcohol as confidence, and used sarcasm as gasoline to bring the burning down to this interaction. And she beams when it works, the other girls wit and snark lighting up her face as if her neck up was aflame with light. This one is different, she thinks. It's not until a small observation tinges the other girls face that you realize the roses burning above her let their color seep down past her hair. Without a doubt, she is different.

And it's been so long since any interaction past 'excuse me' and 'fuck off' has kept her thoroughly entertained, so she clings to her. Blame the drinks, the drugs, anything at all, but this amusingly small girl doesn't seem to mind her latching onto her. Doesn't mind at all, she thinks when this burning roses girl laughs next to you at a boy's overly complicated joke, leaning into her. Staying there.

It wasn't until this burning girl squeezed her wrist gently, telling her she's off to the loo, that she decides to finish her drink and replace it with two. Not both for herself, she smiles, not quite. But in the few seconds it takes her to neck down the rest of the dark liquid, she walks into the next room and finds the same bright burning hair she's grown ridiculously fond of in the crowd, trying to spread its flame to the clearly wasted tosser who's pushed his face on hers. It unsettles her and you think he's trying something on her, so she moves, until she stops abruptly to actually look at the scene unfolding. Hands tugging at his neck, her craning face to have more of him upon her. Suddenly she's the one desperate for the loo, but it won't be coming out the end it should. Decides spliff and tequila are her new partners in crime and walks out of the party with her eyes trained on the floor.

Fuck. So much for not thinking, she thinks. Fuck. But she's already waist deep in reminiscence and remorse so why not indulge a bit more? She was the reason, she thinks, that there's no chance to find interest in anything anymore. It's a bit ridiculous and such a pathetic school girl thought to be put off by a random she met briefly at a party weeks ago. Yet ever since, she hasn't been able to draw in interest in anything other than hill across her house. Tries not think that its because of the lines of roses in the grass she can see from her bedroom window.

Whatever. Tonight is another Friday night, downing tequila until she wakes up next sunset and its another day down. Another day past her. It gets easier with time and fucking time up seems like a pretty good idea right now. The most ridiculous thing, she thinks, is that you shouldn't need time to get over someone who was never remotely yours in the first place. Over a girl whose name you hadn't even been bothered to ask. It was that simple.

Until it wasn't. Until it's not. Her heart more or less disintegrates to ash in her chest as she takes another pull from her fag, and holds it there when a familiar flash a red- one she's damn certain means the scent of flowers in the air soon to arrive- catches her eye like a coin in the sun. Then she learns another lesson from this burning girl- not breathing will do you absolutely no good, she learns the hard way as another rattling cough harks from her throat.

It was the mistaken spark, one she wasn't sure how to feel about, that occurred when thick brown eyes found her own like a shot in the dark- brutal, fast, and its aim obvious. She hated how she felt the restructuring dust starting up from the ash in her chest as the slightest bit of hope seeped in her ribs. She knew where how this would end, and she barely was herself after the first time. Twice? That couldn't happen.

So despite her brutal intention to not care and not think, it was all she could do to think of the fastest route out of there and set her legs in motion before the swelling in her throat gave away exactly how much she did care. She did what she had always done best. Run.

Through party boys and crying drunks, potheads and gossip WAGs, her feet gave a sturdy rhythm pulling herself out of the large house of someone she literally had never heard of in her life. Another stumble through glass and a wave of breeze swoops through her hair and she collapses in the grass just as, as expected, her stomach empties its contents into a far side of a very lush grass lawn. She looks up warily and sighs at the sight of a walled hedge acting as a fence between the obnoxiously large houses. Fucking wealthy splurge spenders and complete disregard for necessity only. She smiles, realizing how refreshing it was to get it out of her system after so long. But as expected, as her smile fades, the thoughts could never last. The fire just wasn't burning enough for her.

Another crash against the glass behind her and her head whips back, noticing in time to see a wildly curly haired boy, off his fucking rocker, not even stumbling but swaying down to the lawn, words slurring and eyes popping around. He was yelling now, not at her but at the sky and the hedge, worrying that he forgot his meds, he was late taking his meds, all about his fucking meds. He paused, woozy on the spot just standing there, before he bolts around the hedges. She sighs, frustrated because all she wanted was to sulk and cringe in peace, but she knew the boy was out of his fucking mind and she knew just how scary it was to pass out outside somewhere, waking up with no recollection of how she got there or what happened. With the bloke screaming about his meds too? Well, she doesn't really have a choice but to follow him. She could slap herself for letting herself fucking care. But she would do that later.

She gets up unsteadily and goes after him around the hedge, only to find a small puddle and mottled grass on the other side. She froze, listening for anything but there is nothing. Not even the sodding crickets are out. She's so confused as to where he could've gone that she almost misses the twinkle of light in the puddle. Curious, she steps forward, completely uncaring of the sludge and mud lining its rim, and peers down its reflection. There was nothing there and just as she's about to fix herself upright, a mighty shove on her back lost her balance and she braces herself for the filthy splash to ensue, absolutely terrified when the ground never comes and instead the wetness grabs her deeper, sliding up her body with the speed that only water clings with. The last thing she sees before her eyes slip beneath the surface to join her body is the unruly, curled hair watching her vanish and the creeping up of a flash of red slipping around the hedges.

How lovely, she thinks, that smell of flowers can even slip through water.