…
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sanguine
Red and the six people who mattered most to him
his maybe love
…
…
my love she throws me like a rubber ball
she won't catch me or break my fall
baby's got blue skies up ahead
but in this I'm a rain cloud
you know she wants dry kind of love
(oh, the sweetest thing)
His kisses taste like candy and mint. But they aren't in love, no. Red's just the boy from next door, and they're ten (just ten) and they don't know what love is.
They play outside during the long hometown summers, along with that other boy. ("Red and Green," her mother remarked once, musingly; "How can you stand to be around both of them at the same time?" As if there's something wrong with that.) But he is the one who laughs the most, tickled pink by the sun and the sprinklers.
They don't stop to think often. They're all about kiss, kiss, run, laugh. He's never serious, and she rarely is. Meanwhile, Green's a bit of a buzzkill, because he's the most serious of them all. Ironic, isn't it?
Maybe they just don't want to think about how next summer, he wants to drop out of school and leave, and she wants to stay at home and learn how to wash clothes and do algebra.
They spend the year in denial. They forget all about what he's planning. He ignores that gut aching that says, 'Hey! Maybe you shouldn't hurt her. She's only a girl, after all. You don't hurt girls.'
And before she knows it, it's the second day of summer and they're in the shade under that big old maple tree next to the Oak's house.
"I'm in love with Green," she confesses, since Green is the one who took the time to tell her a decent goodbye, with a hug and a peck on the lips and everything.
He just laughs and says, "No you're not. Quit lying, Leaf," since he knows that they're still just kids and love's a thing from another time (the past? Or the future?).
She nods. After all, he's leaving tomorrow with a new best friend, and so is Green. She doesn't want him to go. Either 'him'.
After all, she doesn't know a thing about love.
She walks him home and stands awkwardly on his front porch as he waits for his mother to answer the door. She's waiting, too, since it was a lie that she told earlier (maybe) and she wants him to prove that… what? That there's something between them? That he's just been hiding something all these years?
Either way, he doesn't prove anything. His farewell is of the 'best friend' variety, a one-sided hug and a 'See you around' before he disappears.
Why does she get this feeling that she won't be seeing him around?
She smiles for him one last time, but when he's gone, so is she, and on the way home, she wants to curl up in her bed and never leave.
She doesn't understand a thing about love, but maybe in her own way she does. And she hopes she'll never come across it again.
Her mother finds her the next morning with swollen lines under her eyes, curled around the household pet and shivering. And she smiles, because she is the one that knows all about love, and that it would work out in the end, if the little girl could just have patience.
Isn't love the sweetest thing?
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Author's Note: I said no pairings, but apparently there's some BurningLeaf and some implied OldRival. I'm not partial to either, but it did fit the song. So there.
I don't really like this one, but there's nothing I can do, given the time limit. Hope you enjoyed it, regardless.
"Sweetest Thing", again by U2. I don't own the song or the characters.