A/N: boy oh boy do I hate writing in first person and in present tense. This drabble was a challenge all around.
Quiet
nineteen years old
It is amazing the kind of silence that can surround you, even while you're being inundated with sound. The ocean is roaring in my ears, the beachside fire crackling merrily along in the cold air of an early spring evening. My friends, my family are all laughing and talking either while sitting around the fire or in the nearby pavilion tent mounted in the sand. It isn't any special occasion. Not my birthday or any royal holiday. It had been a whim of my mother's for years to be on the water on the first day the weather wouldn't freeze us down to our very toes. And it had sort of become a tradition. Food would be packed to bring along, but nothing that needed to be prepared and we would invite those essential to the running of our household so that we could run the kingdom. And we would just...be. Together. It was warm and rich in the way a too-decadent chocolate dessert could be. I loved it (almost as much as I love chocolate). It had turned into my favorite day of the entire year.
And then, out of nowhere, fireworks burst into the sky and added to the impossible amount of noise. I gasp in surprise and then stare in awe, like a schoolgirl, at the eye-catching designs that painted the dark sky. The sounds pop and explode but something else calls my attention. I'd never know why but I knew exactly where to look. I turn my head over my shoulder and catch Cedric's glance and it's like he's seeing me for the very first time. I know my hands are fidgeting but I hope he doesn't notice as the sound all around me fades away into the dark pools he has the audacity to call eyes. It's almost eerily quiet. It's him and me and I stare at him, trying to be a woman, not a girl. Trying to be everything he might want. Until I give up on that and just try to be me, instead. I laugh, I can't help it, and he - oh sweet powers above and all around - he smiles right back at me and I see it! I see him finally let go and let me in.
And then the sounds come flooding back. The conversation and the ocean and the fireworks as a log in the fire snaps under the strain of the heat and brings my ears back to the present. I bite the corner of my lip in anticipation and he somehow chastises me with his just gaze and not a single other muscle in his face. My face flushes as I turn to face the flames again and start to concoct a plan to let me flee from my favorite day of the year.