Barbies and Lighters
Prologue
When Gill was young, he was beautiful.
Thankfully, every feature that he had was that of his mother. Her figure was thin and wispy, her legs were long and her face was that of happiness. Her hair was a perfectly straight blonde, so bright it looked white when she stood in the sunlight. It seemed only she had the ability to make the rainbows look more beautiful when she stood next to them, and Mayor Hamilia was a beautiful person underneath her surface through and through.
Renowned as prodigal, Gill earned the title of "The Mayor's Beautiful Son" to everyone that knew him. Quiet, smart, bookish, even those traits could never overshadow "beautiful". It was only his antisocial personality that held him back from making any friends, and kids could be cruel.
When Hamilia died, it was the beginning of Gill's end.
When Mayor Hamilton was put in charge, "The Mayor's Beautiful Son" dwindled. Eventually, the title "beautiful" became associated with "intelligent". If some were feeling generous, or if they knew the family from long ago, they'd even go so far as to replace "intelligent" with "hardworking".
The rainbows died a few months after Mayor Hamilia was put to rest in the town Cemetery. With Gill being too young to care about anything other than his mother being put into the ground, later he'd look back on this memory and critique on the service. The flowers were wrong. The headstone should have been engraved with more than "Here Lies Mayor Hamilia". She deserved a better service.
From then on, he devoted himself to attaining the responsibilities given to his father. His Dad could never have taken care of Waffle Town more than he could he mused, so when his father offered him a job at the Town Hall, he jumped at the chance.
It was only later when Gill really thought about it did he notice the boy in his memories that he hadn't taken notice of before.
Gill and Chase, 6 and 11
It was raining. Gill stayed after the service to pay his respects to his mother's grave.
There was no point in sitting, even after the two hours that he'd stayed sniffling over his mother's tomb. His father understood, giving him a pat on the shoulder before going back to his home, presumably to do the same grieving.
Despite his appearance in contrast to his mother, his father was the epitome of everything rightly spoken in the world. He knew that kids needed the same time to cry that adults did, and in his silent nod he had told Gill to 'come home soon'. In his look back over his shoulder, he added 'before you catch a cold'.
Gill didn't listen. His father may have been the voice of everything rightly spoken, but it didn't mean he had to listen. He had his black umbrella rested on his right shoulder, and that was all he needed.
Chase had just moved into the inn with his birthparents. They feared he was too young to understand the concept of grief, and it wouldn't have mattered seeing as he didn't know Mayor Hamilia anyway, so they permitted him leave to wander the town and introduce himself.
Even though it was raining, Chase stuck his arms into the sleeves of his gray sweater and zippered it up to the collar. He shoved his feet into his purple rain boots, shoved his hands into his pockets, and called back to his parents to let them know he was leaving. When they didn't respond because of their quiet talks with Yolanda, he left anyway, heading off into Maple Lake District.
Growing up in the city, the rural side was a nice kind of different. It was weird being allowed outside without someone to walk with him through the streets, but his parents seemed relatively calm about letting him talk to strangers around here, so he didn't mind.
One peculiar stranger he saw from across the hill. From the height of him, it looked like he was a lot younger. Under normal circumstances, he wouldn't think about introducing himself. Playing with little kids was annoying, and they didn't grasp the same things that he could. They were babies, and Chase could be considered an adult.
Chase caught himself staring. This stranger was a beautiful stranger, and from a little ways away, this stranger looked like a pretty girl that he could talk to. It didn't quite register that he was in the Cemetery, and much less wearing black. Even though girls were gross, it couldn't hurt to make friends with a pretty one.
Gill sniffled as he stared into the slanted lettering of his Mother's grave. He could read at a fifth grade level, but these words didn't make sense. They were just randomly strung letters that didn't mean anything but had all the meaning in the world.
As Chase shuffled closer, Gill didn't bother turning his head to the sound of kicked rocks. Chase's hands were balled up in fists in his pockets, and Gill's held loose around the handle of his umbrella.
"Hey."
The voice of a stranger in the cemetery with him didn't change the direction of his head. Gill still looked down at the headstone of where his mother was buried, sniffling quietly before rubbing his runny nose on the sleeve of his sweater. He didn't care about getting sick. He didn't care about anything.
"Are you okay?"
The sound of concern in this strangers voice was the only reason Gill tore his gaze away from his mother's burial plot. Still wiping his nose off on his sweater, he stared puffy-eyed into the face of another boy who looked a little older. Gill didn't want to speak to anyone, but there was something about talking to another kid like himself that changed things.
"... hey."
He couldn't drudge up the energy to speak anything but quietly, his tiny chest heaving with every broken sob he tried so hard to push back.
"Hey. Are you okay?"
Gill didn't respond.
"Well, I guess you're not okay if you're still crying. Do you want to hang out with me?"
The sound of "hanging out" sounded weird in Chase's mouth, at least in his own opinion. He thought that the sound of hanging out sounded older, like what big kids did. He was too old to "play" anymore, even if games were fun. Gill didn't seem to notice that anything was amiss and shook his head no. Broken sobs still pushed out of his chest, heaving breaths heavy with sadness.
"That sucks."
Chase stood still for a while, listening to the rain fall while just a few feet from this strange girl who couldn't stop crying and didn't want to "hang out".
When Gill got the strength to move from his spot and travel slowly down the arch that lead from the cemetery, the boy that asked him if he'd like to hang out was gone.
