"Bonds"

"Hey. How are you doing?"

Shadow's eyes meet mine for a fraction of a second before flicking back to the dark, wet road ahead. He takes a sharp, shallow breath and straightens suddenly, as if he's been jabbed in the back with a flaming torch.

"Fine," he spits, tightening his grip on the steering wheel. "Why do you care?"

There it is again – the cold, defensive, fuck-you attitude that I've come to hate and love. I almost reach out to touch his arm but stop myself before the urge to shatter him overwhelms me. Instead, I fold my arms over my chest and turn to stare at the passing rain-soaked landscape. My eyes might be elsewhere, but my attention is still focused in the same spot.

He knows of it, I'm sure.

"Never mind, then," I simply say, closing my eyes and leaning my head against the right side of the window. I hear him scoff and mutter something under his breath, giving me the one sign that I've already won our little game.

"What was that?" I inquire innocently, opening one eye to view him in all his frustrated, angry glory. "I didn't catch that."
"Go to hell," he seethes, waving a hand in my direction as if to make me disappear.

I smirk and turn my face back towards the window.

We ride in uneventful albeit painful silence for a minute or two, the road bouncing me along and making me hit my head more than once. As he shows no signs of speaking further, I turn my attention to the squeaking of the windshield wipers and the crackling of the tires as they skim along the wet pavement. I can't help but picture the wind rushing through the trees, the warm sun beating down on my back, the endless stretches of green, brown, and orange lying far beyond my reach.

If only it wasn't raining, damn it.

"Why did you bother?"

My left ear twitches at the softly spoken words. Opening both eyes this time around, I tune back in to Shadow FM.

"Huh?"

"You heard me. Answer me," he growls, never taking his eyes off the road for a second. "Why did you bother to ask me for a ride? Why couldn't you have called one of your friends? Why me? I'm your goddamned rival, Sonic. We only speak to each other when we have no other choice; so why did you ask me, of all people, for a ride home tonight?"

I open my mouth with the intention of stuttering, but honesty spews out before I can take a breath.

"I wanted to give you a chance to be social."

"Oh, please. Don't pity me, Sonic."

"I'm not pitying you. You just – you fascinate me, Shadow."

I don't know what I expected from him: confusion, anger, or even both. Whatever it had been, I'm not finding it here.

"Really," he huffs. "How, exactly, do I fascinate you?"

My big mouth can't stay shut. "It's everything. It's your personality, your attitude, the way you talk, the things that you do. You're a puzzle to the rest of the world, but to me you're a mystery that'll be damned if it ever gets solved."

The dead silence returns, stirring up something akin to nausea in my stomach. While painfully waiting for a reply, I fiddle with the dials on the radio, tuning it to this station and that even though it's off. I almost want to turn it on just so I'll have something neutral to concern myself with, something non-Shadowy, something non-threatening and comforting.

I could really use a familiar old melody right now. The awkwardness of this whole situation is not something that I envisioned when I got into Shadow's car tonight, and I want it gone. If there's no way to make it disappear, I at least want it drowned out by a song loud enough to put me back at ease.

Maybe some 80's rock would do.

"It's pointless," Shadow calmly remarks, throwing himself back onboard my train of thought.

"But I like the challenge."

"There is no challenge. It's all in your head."

"That's crap and you know it."

"Damn it, Sonic!" He pulls over in the parking lot of a deli, his angered expression illuminated by the flickering neon lights. "Just come out and say it, won't you!"

"Say what? What are you talking about, Shadow?" I'm confused, annoyed, and even a little angry myself, but those emotions don't mean a thing right now. Shadow is in front of me, his arms on either side of me, glaring at me like he's ready to tear my throat out. I grit my teeth and clench my fists, preparing to smash his head into the dashboard, when all of a sudden...

…Shadow's lips are on mine, cold and hard and only slightly damp.

Now there's no way I'll be able to stop myself. My brain glazes over, my entire body freezes, and the only thing I can feel is the sensation of his ice-cold kiss. I don't even realize that I've closed my eyes until I open them to the sight of Shadow straddling me.

Somehow, by some great miracle, I begin to melt just a little. With very little idea of what to do now that Shadow's rerouted the tension between us, I open my mouth while it's still pressed against his. He hums – or moans, I don't know which – quietly in approval, slowly sliding his tongue past and over mine. I follow his lead, mindlessly meeting him at each step of the dance. His mouth doesn't taste like anything, really – it's all cool and slick and surprisingly inviting.

Before this unexpected turn of events unfolded, I never imagined that making out with my own rival would feel this good; but it does, it does, more than any run I've ever gone on or ever will go on, and I want it to continue. I want to stumble across that fabled door with him and open it with our joined hands. I want to feel him and show him how to feel me. I want to give him a chance, one chance to prove that he's not so bad after all; that he has a heart and wants to fill it with love for the first time in fifty years.

I brush my hands along his arms as we deepen our kiss, steadily making my way down to his wrists. Before I get the chance to wrap my fingers around them and pull his arms tight around my waist, he stiffens and abruptly breaks our connection.

"You've ruined it," he croaks, looking at me like I'm a puppy that just peed all over the floor. "You've ruined it."

"Like hell I did!" Upon realizing that Shadow's lost interest in forming a bond with me, I shove him, hard, back into the driver's seat. "I didn't do a thing! You were the one that kissed me!"

"That doesn't matter anymore." The rigid posture remains. In an attempt to make his discomfort more obvious, he crosses his legs at the knee. I can't help but notice that he's squeezing his thighs together very tightly, as if he's trying to hide something from me. "If you had simply gone along with the plan, everything would have been perfect. But you just had to go and ruin it, didn't you?"

"Shadow, I–" It's now that I find myself at a complete loss for words. What can I possibly say to him now? How can I possibly defend myself when I haven't done a thing wrong?

Or have I?

"You said that you are fascinated by me," he blurts, fixing his unfathomably deep ruby-red eyes on me. "Well, guess what. The feeling is mutual."

I don't know what to say. I don't know what to think. I only know that I want to wrap him in my arms and feed him precious little lies.

"Shadow, why in the world–"

"Enough." He pulls out of the parking lot and resumes driving as if nothing had ever happened. Though I'm still unsettled, I allow myself to lean back against the window and look out at the beautiful night.

The sound of his voice breaks the sensory chaos.

"I'm taking you home with me."

"What?! Why?!"

"Like I said, you ruined it." He glances at me, a shadow of a smirk falling over his face. "But there's still all night to fix what you destroyed."

~The End~