Underneath the Stars

by newtypeshadow

A girl and her boyfriend are stargazing in an abandoned park on the night the first Eve War ends. *oneshot*

The Common People -- Underneath the Stars

~by newtypeshadow

The characters and writing are mine, the GW setting is not.

The Common People concept belongs to Kielle and Phil Foster. (http://www.subreality.com/tcp.htm) It was introduced to me on NYS by Lt. Noin with their permission.

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We were lying out underneath the stars that night. It was beautiful. Just beautiful. It was all so serene there on the blanket in the abandoned park. It was the best type of night to be out, the kind where the mosquitoes don't bother you, the breeze is just right, and the temperature is chilly enough to snuggle, but not so cold that one needs a jacket. The park was closed that night -- and every night after 5pm -- but we'd snuck in anyway. We were two teenagers in love, and nothing could stop us -- not laws, not parents. Nothing.

I remember his arm wrapped protectively around my shoulder; my head resting on his chest; my ears echoing with the rhythm of his heartbeat; my hands playing with the strands of his shoulder length hair as it glided smoothly over my fingers, which lazily twisted and curled the black strands against the backdrop of shadowed trees.

We were stargazing that night, or at least, that's what it started out as. We eventually stopped looking at the stars, and instead drank in each other and the romantic atmosphere. We had chosen a secluded spot on a flat meadow of flowers to set our blanket. They were the purple ones, the ones with the feather soft petals that come in fours, and are everywhere you look in the spring. The clover was everywhere too, hidden in the uncut grass. It would have been lovely during the daytime, but it was past evening, the sun had already set, and everything

was bathed in darkness. The park had no lighting system, and who could blame them? It was always closed shortly after sundown. It was a few days past the new moon that night, and the dim moonlight was unable to break through the grove of trees surrounding our little spot. It was all the better. I didn't want anyone, even the moon, to interrupt us in such a private place. When I looked up, my vision was ringed by the dark trees framing the stars, which shined brightly in the midnight blue sea that was the sky.

It was a war zone up there, beyond our atmosphere, but we were oblivious. For the most part, the war thus far had had the courtesy not to directly involve people I knew, and I reveled in the freedom it brought me.

I sighed shakily, trying to dispel the horde of butterflies fluttering around my stomach, spreading to my arms, legs, neck, and scrambling my brain into utter chaos, keeping me from thinking a single coherent thought apart from being with him. I closed my eyes and allowed myself to sink into him, content with the feeling of warmth and seclusion shared with him only, with the feeling that the world could wait, and schoolgirl thought of our inevitable happy ending. My cheek was pressed against his firm chest, and I could feel the even beats of his heart as it sent shockwave after shockwave tingling down my spine. It was so different than my own, which thumped wildly within my ribcage faster than my little brother beating on his snare drums. He was actually quite talented, but that was inconsequential, because I wasn't going to think about him when I had a night alone with my boyfriend.

I had been so worried that evening when he'd called and said he had to see me. I didn't know why, and had immediately assumed he'd been drafted or simply decided to go to war. The moment he stopped his small gray car in front of my house, I was out my door and in the seat next to him, buckling my seat belt with shaking hands and cold fingers. I was almost out of my mind at that point, but I tried to hide my mild hysteria when I saw the confused, angry look on his face. The shadows accented his narrowed eyebrows and pursed lips, making him appear sinister, even dangerous. He had turned to me, tossing black unruly bangs out of his face with quick a flip of his head, and managed a forced grin before returning his eyes to the road and speeding quickly down my street and away from my house. I looked questioningly at him, studying his face as it changed from light to dark to light again, cut into pieces that rearranged themselves time and again by the light of the passing street lamps and traffic lights. I sat back silently and waited for his explanation, my eyes only occasionally leaving his face to look out the dashboard and see where we were going. It took the five minutes it requires to travel from my house to the freeway for him to speak.

He and his father had had an argument. They'd had arguments before, but only over school and little, inconsequential things. This one was different. His father had wanted him to enroll in the military, to join the United Earth-Sphere Alliance and fight for freedom, justice, and peace between earth and space, or some other noble goal that was pure nonsense and was meant for other people, not us. My boyfriend thought the same and said so, not wanting to go, not caring about the consequences. He and his father, large retired military officer that he was, had commenced a yelling match his mother had tried in vain to stop.

He said, his eyes beginning to glisten, that his father had grabbed him by his collar and suspended him about a foot off their living room floor. It made no difference that his tiny mother had begged, pleaded, cried, even screamed at his father to reconsider. Or that my boyfriend was a varsity quarterback and by far the strongest boy in our school, or that his father had already put him through a series of boot camps to make him an unbeatable fighter. None of it mattered, apparently, because he'd then been hurled like a rag doll against a wall, his falling body smashing through their coffee table as it succumbed to gravity. The only thing that mattered was that a son had disobeyed the order of a father, and had to be punished. My boyfriend had simply stood up amid the splintered wood, kissed his mother, and left the house. He'd called from a pay phone on the way to my place, he said. All I could do was shake my head at his story and rest my hand on his arm, hoping it would help.

The car had been steadily gaining speed as he spoke, and when he finished the engine was thundering while we flew past trees, houses, cities. He'd finally turned off the freeway, made a left, right, and three more lefts, and parked the car in front of an inconspicuous section of an ivy-covered stone wall. He'd opened the trunk and pulled out the blanket he's kept there since his car broke down on the highway in a December snowstorm, and proceeded to lead me to a hole in the wall hidden by thick, leafy vines.

We pulled back the vines and ducked through the opening, emerging at the top of a hill overlooking a valley covered in a shroud of darkness. I turned to take the blanket from him, and only then noticed a sign screwed into the wall on the inside. I squinted my eyes and read the white lettering, glowing dimly with the aid of the street lamps on the other side of the wall. 'No Visitors 5pm-6am.' I realized where we were. I told him we should leave, but he said he had somewhere to show me. I was hesitant and nervous; I'm usually a good kid.

He kissed me.

I followed him.

He'd led me, blindfolded and half-heartedly protesting the illegality of our being there, into a little clearing. We were stretched out, lying on the blanket, and completely relaxed, almost lethargic -- when it happened. I had closed my eyes, content to the point of drowsiness, and was beginning to drift off when he suddenly shook me, urgently repeating my name while lifting me into a sitting position. "Look at the sky," he told me. I gazed sleepily at him through half closed eyelids as our noses met and his long bangs caressed my cheeks, sending sparks of electricity dancing up and down my spine. I finally understood what he had said through my blissful daze and peered up at the sky.

The sky was afire with thousands upon thousands of tiny white lights. Shooting stars showered the heavens in an unending stream of white against dark, brightening the sky so it almost looked as though day had returned. I couldn't help but stare at the breathtaking display with gaping mouth and wide eyes. The beauty and majesty of it all -- the lights blazing past our little clearing from one side of the leafy frame of trees to the other -- boggled my mind further than the warm happiness of being with my boyfriend. They all went from right to left, which seemed strange, and whenever one disappeared, two more appeared to replace it. "It's beautiful..." I whispered, awestruck. My boyfriend chuckled softly at the childlike wonder displayed openly on my face while wiping a tear from my eyes I hadn't known was there. Then I was pulled to him and surrounded by the blanket and his strong arms. I smiled at him and giggled happily before we returned our gazes to the sky, and the two of us stared together at the phenomenon above us -- two faces of the millions around the world watching, in curiosity and wonder, at nature's celebration of the conclusion of the war to end all wars.