"UNCLE SAM TAUGHT HIM TO SHOOT MAYBE A LITTLE TOO WELL!"
"Oh my God.."
"NOOOOOO! NOOOO MORE SOR--oompf."
"Ha."
"Jackass."
"I know."
Taylor glared up at Derek from where he knocked her over and she fell alongside the wall. She felt her rear end burn as the blood flowed unevenly from where she had fallen. "You're going to pay for that." Taylor mumbled as she stood up and started towards Derek where he had walked a little way ahead.
"Oooh, I'm so scared." Derek waved his fingers around. "I'm so scared of someone a foot short than me." Derek slapped his hand on top of her head. "Shorty."
Taylor stuck her tongue out and then ducked under his hand and continued walking towards Hollister, where she ducked inside it.
"Oh COME ON." Derek wailed as he saw her disappear inside the smelling prep people store. "This is so unfair."
"Too bad." Taylor poked her head around the corner and gave him a look. "It's fair."
"Nuh uh. This lasts longer. It's like an after taste."
"And the bruise on my ass will last longer than this. So." with that Taylor disappeared again. Five minutes passed before she reappeared. Derek made a face before she even got close to him.
"SMELL ME, DEREK, SMELL!" Taylor lifted her arm up and rubbed the sleeve of her jacket against Derek's face, who instinctively pushed her hand away and covered his nose with his hand.
"Ew."
"You know you liiike it." Taylor wrapped her arms around Derek, trying to get the scent of the Hollister store on him; Derek squirmed around before he broke her grip.
"EW." His nose wrinkled with disgust as he stepped away from her. "You stink."
"I smelled better when I didn't smell like Hollister?"
"Maybe." Derek raised an eyebrow. "Anything smells better than Hollister. Prep."
"Am not."
"Are too. As of now."
"DEREK."
"Your fault."
"How?"
"Cause you went in there to intentionally smell like them to piss me off."
"You pushed me, though."
"Cause you were singing."
"Ya know what..."
"No, what?"
"RAGE!" Taylor threw her hands of up the air and then brough one down and slapped Derek across the shoulder, then darted off towards the intersection of the mall.
"What..the hell?" Derek watched as she ran off, everyone passing around him giving him and her retreating figure a weird look. Derek sighed, then turned his face upwards towards the sky windows and said, "Why? WHY THE HELL DOES THIS ALWAYS HAPPEN? Oh my GOD it's like watching a little KID!?" Before anyone else could give him weird looks, Derek headed off after her, though walking.
By the time he caught up with her, she was sitting down on a bench, looking up at the sky, which had quickly grew into a gray color, promising rain. Taylor didn't even notice him sit down next to her.
"It's gonna rain, maybe we should go?" she turned to face him after a few moments, watching the sky turn darker.
"I have to run to Target for something. It's just across the street in the other plaza." Derek nodded towards the direction of their usual exitting doors.
"'Kay." Taylor got up off the bench and Derek followed her, heading outside.
The sky turned a darker gray and the wind was picking up, the leaves blowing around and the feeling of humidity rising as it grew warmer and slightly wet. Far off in the distance you can see the darker clouds forming and slowly making their way towards the mall and the general area of it; the sun was a stikingly white contrast to the dark luminous creeping clouds.
"Eh." Derek frowned. "Let's get going."
"Yeah." Taylor followed after him, heading across the parking lot and towards the main road. It started drizzling lightly as they stopped at the curb and waited for the traffic to die down lightly. When it did, the two of them ran across the street, ignoring the honks that some of the cars gave when they got to close to colliding with the front end of the vehicle.
By the time they made it across the large parking lot, the rain had fallen harder and large puddles were forming in the lots where the ground lowered than the rest. Derek turned and ran underneath the cover of Target's rain protectors that hung on the edge of the building, Taylor following behind slightly at a slower pace.
"Uhm, I have to run inside and get something. It won't take long." Derek mumbled before he turned to the doors and went inside.
Taylor sighed and leaned against the side of the wall, staring at the concrete sidewalk and tracing the cracks with her eyes as she waited for him to get whatever it was he needed. She didn't looked up as she heard footsteps draw near, or the running noises people made trying to get inside the building or underneath the roof that hung off slightly so the rain could slide off. She sighed as she waited, and the looked up when she heard the faint noise of the tornado sirens.
"Aw, shit." She mumbled as it grew louder and the wind picked up; the clouds grew darker as they creeped over the slowly setting sun. She turned to go insde Target right as she ran into a figure coming out. "Ouch."
"Sorry." Derek gave her a weird look. "Nevermind, just making sure...you.."
Taylor looked up at him. "AWWW!' she squealed, pointing a finger at him. "You care!"
"No!" Derek glared at her. "Just making sure you weren't a dumbass and stayed outside."
"Uh huh. Sure."
"Whatever, get inside."
"Pfft." Taylor made her trademark noise before she followed him inside the building where all the shoppers were grouping towards the middle of the store, the manager standing on a large box and watching the group grow.
"I want all of you to please settle down and be quiet. We are told this is a pretty bad storm, so please, get comfortable." he called out as some of the people made their way to sit down next to the shelves.
Derek slowly made his way away from the rest of the people and sat farthest away from the group, Taylor following him slowly.
"Why do you move away from the general group?" she asked as she watched him sit down on the floor.
"Cause I don't know them people." Derek responded. "Like I want to sit next to people I don't know."
Taylor rolled her eyes before she sat down a few feet down from him. "There's a higher chance you can get injured than them, you an throw someone in front of you." Taylor laughed.
"That's what you're for."
Taylor didn't say anything as he said this, instead remaining quiet and looking down at the floor, not looking up at him in the face.
"I didn't mean it like that, you know that right?" Derek caught the look on her face and frowned. "I wasn't serious, I wouldn't do that to you."
Taylor still didn't say anything. Then after a few moments, Derek went to move and she looked up at him. "Hah, that's fine, if it's you I'm saving, then I'm okay with it." she said softly and then proceeded to bring her knees up and hug them, staring at her black Converse.
Derek stopped moving and made a weird facial expression before he sat back along the wall.
Moments passed as the manager instructed people where to sit before the lights went out and the back up ones flickered on. A few people squealed or screamed in shock as the sirens came on again, louder, and the wind and rain could be heard beating against the walls of te store. Everything grew silent again as the wind picked up and the windows started to shake. Derek looking up at one of the windows that was high up on the wall, watching it shake roughly as the wind hit against it.
The manager made calming motions as one of the smaller windows near the front broke open and the glass shattered on impact as it hit the tiled floor. "Now now people! We're safe! Calm down, please."
"Yeah, like they can calm down when the freaking windows are breaking." Taylor mumbled to herself as she stretched her legs out and watched a lady with her baby rock back and forth, the woman hugging the holy hell out of the infant as she shook.
Out of no where, the window Derek was watching broke and shot downwards as the window started blowing some of the lighter items around. Taylor jumped and watched as some of the shelves shook when aother window near the front broke. One by one, glass started flying out and towards the floor, barely making it to the customers as the cowered away; some of the smaller pieces slid away when another large gust of wind either broke a window or blew in through one of the already broken panes.
The lady with her baby screamed when she felt the pressure of the tornado pull on the roof of the building, making some of the glass to shake and the window blow harder. "Oh my God, please no!" she cried when the sounds of bending metal broke through the shouts of the other people.
After one good blow from the wind, the roof tore away halfway across the length of the building and anything not tied down and was light automatically shot up. When the roof tore away more, the heavier things started being lifted up in the air.
Taylor brought her hands up over her head and bent forward, bringing her knees up and covering her face with them. The pressure of the tornado pulled at some of the shelves and the noise of groaning metal was heard as the the screws keeping them down broke and rolled across the floor a few inches before being sucked up as well. As the wind picked up, some of the items started swirling around before shooting up roughly. A metal pole that was used as the base of the window pains started to show through as the parts around it chipped away from the wind. Derek watched the chaos of the people cowering and holding on to each other; he slowly watched around the room for any signs of an actual danger, aside from the natural one itself, the tornado.
Everything happened in slow motion as the manager spotted one of the grill utensils shoot off the rack and fly towards them as it was headed for the eye of the tornado. He ducked just in time and Derek noticed it's line of direction. He propped himself on his hands and knees as Taylor looked up at him.
"Der-?" she went to call his name but he shot at her quickly and knocked her over sideways. "What the fuck?" Taylor gasped when Derek hit her and the both fell over against the floor; instinctively she put her hands up and pushed Derek away when he fell down on her. "Derek?"
"Ouch." he muttered as he rolled over and looked up at the grey sky, the items still shooting around and paper going crazy.
"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?" she shouted, coveirng the noise of the sharp cooking utensil as it stabbed into the wall where she had just been sitting against.
"That!" Derek pointed to the sharp object, glaring at her. "You dumbass, I saved your life. And you're yelling at me?"
"Well, I didn't ask you to save me!" Taylor shouted back at him and made him catch his breath before he opened his mouth again to respond.
"Yeah, well I did, maybe next time I'll keep that in mind." Derek snapped before he picked himself off the floor; neither of them noticed the wind dying down and the rain pick up, showering them, before it abruptly stopped.
Taylor sighed as she pushed hair out of her face and picked herself off the floor as well. "Fine. You do that."
"I will." Derek muttered before he headed for the door, ignoring the manager; Taylor crossed her arms and followed, staying away from him but keeping a close proximity.
When they managed to get to their street, they still hadn't said anything to each other. Taylor still kept her arms crossed over her chest and kept walking even as Derek stopped and headed for his door.
"Later." she snapped as she kept walking, Derek not saying anything back before he slammed his door.