CHAPTER 14

Cleo opened her eyes to find herself in her own bed. She rolled over and looked at her alarm clock, dreading going to school, she was way too tired. Maybe she'd fake a sicky? But that was just a fantasy; her mum never let her stay off school. The alarm clock read 14:26 and for a moment Cleo though it must be broken, before everything came back to her, along with a wave of nausea. The adults disappearing, the wall appearing, the true horrors of the FAYZ. And last of all, the load of injured kids that Cleo had been healing. How selfish of her to fall asleep on them! They needed her and she'd just been in bed, snoozing! She jumped up, ignoring the tired pleads from her body and rushed downstairs to find Pippa playing with her doll's house in the lounge, Oskar curled up at her side. She smiled as she watched the two of them from the doorway and wished she could stay and play happy families with them, but she knew she had a job to do. She entered the room to tell them she had to go, but nearly had a heart attack when she noticed another person in the room, sitting on the sofa and always watching the two of them with a smile on their face.

"Oh, you're up" He grinned when he saw Cleo standing there.

"S-Sam…what are you doing here?" Cleo asked and Sam grinned.

"Looking after these two." He smiled. "Thought you deserved a little rest."

"But what about you? I thought you were up to your neck in things to do…" Sam nodded grimly.

"Yeah, thought I'd hide out for a while, they'll survive without me for a couple of hours, besides, Edilio can manage fine without me. I've just won a war for god's sake…" He rolled his eyes. "Mad, isn't it? Remember when we were just two quiet kids sitting next to each other in English?" Cleo nodded, smiling sadly, wishing they were back in the old days. As she looked at Sam's handsome face, aged by the-woah, hold up, had she just thought of him as handsome? He was just Sam, Sam the hero yes, but not Sam the handsome hero! Sam frowned, noticing Cleo's panic. "You alright?" He asked, standing up and moving closer towards her worriedly. Cleo just stared at him, and as they looked into each other's eyes, she noticed his expression change. Were similar thoughts filling his mind?

Sam looked into Cleo's big amber eyes, so kind and gentle and he noticed for the first time how beautiful she was. They'd known each other for years but he'd never thought of her in that way before…but then as he thought about her, he couldn't think of a single fault with her. He subconsciously moved closer.

Cleo stared back into his warm chocolate eyes, so soft, so warm; melting her heart. Suddenly his lips were on hers and she was kissing him back, as he wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her closer. She wrapped her own arms around his neck, fingers playing with his soft, scruffy brown hair. She didn't know how long they stayed like that for; just that she felt safe at last, like someone was there to look after her for a change, rather than the other way round. When they finally broke apart, they stayed standing there together, holding each other close for a while longer. Both of them glad to have the other there to comfort them against things that the other didn't know.

Cleo didn't know what was going to happen, whether the wall would ever come down or not, whether Pippa and Oskar would be ok, whether Caine and his cronies would ever come back, but for the moment it didn't matter. She had Sam, and Sam would look after her. He was different, he was special.

Sam held Cleo close, he had a lot of responsibility being the leader of the FAYZ, responsibility that he would gratefully hand over at the first chance, but as he rested his head on Cleo's, breathing in the smell of her apple scented shampoo, he realised that she was his responsibility now, and this was one responsibility he was glad to have, one that he wouldn't give away for anything. He was going to look after Cleo through all of this. He squeezed her tight.

THE END.