He had taken her to places she'd only dreamed about.
Vacant houses, abandoned shopping malls and rooftops in the city. A closed theme park where you could, if you knew how, turn on all the lights and music.
Though his interest in the places they visited waned quickly, his interest in her only intensified. She was just a schoolgirl, but to him she was more than that. But then they visited these places, they acted just like any teenagers might – running after each other through mazes of popcorn stands and rusted roller-coasters, wrecking the remainders of a pape-maiche raindeer, eating chocolate left behind by the snackbar.
He had wrestled her, both laughing, into a plastic boat meant to ride through the love tunnel, now broken down. The water below them had turned green and sickly, once nicely trimmed roses grew wild and dipped into the water and covered some of the boats like a giant claw.
The weather was too cold and they were too young and stupid to care for things like wearing mittens and proper shoes. Their noses and hands were turning red, the breath coming out in clouds as they shivered.
He had her in his lap and she felt warm in other places than her hands. It was a new feeling, one she wasn't sure how to feel about. He was looking at her, her neck, his hands on her hips clutching her tighter. The boat was small and didn't leave much room for movement. Her heart was beating fast and he slipped one hand inside her coat, underneath her shirt. She shivered a little at first, since his hand was cold. But he knew that, just as he knew that a kiss to her throat would make her heart race, her eyelashes flutter.
She knew that he got her, that he knew every insidious thought in her head.
Nobody else could make her feel this way. Nobody else could take her apart and tell her a story at the same time, she could read it in the pattern of his freckles, the things he said as he made her come, how he brought her to that place where they both were equals, and the world was her kingdom, and she was the princess.
He knew that a princess needed knives in her pockets and a man who could make her laugh.
After that first time, she hugged him close, held onto him as tight as she dared.
"You can never leave me." she had whispered, and he'd smiled, almost a mocking smile at her – his cheeks red and his eyes black and hard. But they were serious then, his eyes. They always gave him away.
"Pinky promise I won't." he'd said, waving the digit at her, making her grin.
