Cupid's Bow
Chapter 3
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On Earth, the first and last time I'd ever been surprised was when they'd told me they were dropping me into Oblivion.
Every other single aspect of my life had been expected, pre-determined, if you want to be really specific about it. I had been told and taught and assigned, and I'd been shown the path my life would take. Routine was what we lived by, and routine was good. Routine was normal. Safe.
But that changed the day they switched me, suddenly realised that the life I'd been living should have been assigned to someone else.
When had they made this error? The day they'd created me in a test tube.
So that's twenty years. Twenty years it took for them to realise that, hey, I think we've made a little mistake here.
Only it wasn't little. It was my already-planned-out life, and they'd destroyed it in an instant.
I remember being frozen when they told me, frozen in the line to the drop. I froze at the sight of Them, so that's how my surprise, my shock, manifested. I'm still not accustomed to the feeling, so my feet grow real, proper tree roots as I stand there, watching the water come to life.
The sparkles on the previously calm tide start to slowly rise, forming around a single block that should be impossible for it to do. But as I watch, it only grows taller, taller, taller, until it sprouts a body.
My dry throat catches my sounds as the glinting stops being so see-through, and becomes real-life flesh. Arms rise up and sweep through the little waves, creating a tsunami that splashes down across bright burning hair, sending little shards of glitter dripping down onto a real-life face.
My gasp draws the water from my already dried-out tongue.
At that, I watch as eyes snap open through the wet. My hands immediately clap themselves over my mouth, terrified. Because colour infuses his gaze, and it brings the rest of him to life.
He's one of Them.
Surprise quickly morphs into fear as I watch his eyes look into my cover, like he's looking right at me. I hope beyond hope that I'm too far away for that, that all he can be seeing is the colour and the green, so much more prevalent than the typical grey of my clothes – covering me toe to neck, with the addition of a hat hiding my hair away.
But the more I think about it, the more I panic. Clearly, I'm not part of this landscape, so won't that just make me more noticeable?
But fear has the same feeling as surprise – only doubled. So my feet remain rooted. All I can manage to do is drop to the ground again, hands still clasped to my mouth as I try to remain as still and quiet and invisible as possible.
My heart thunders as his eyes drip closed, but I don't dare move a muscle. Not yet, I think. Just wait. In a minute he'll…
But he doesn't.
He just stays like that, body looking frozen like mine but not. I watch his chest expand when he breathes, each breath seemingly quicker than the last, and his skin shudder with whatever it is he keeps inhaling. He's unsettling to look at, even more so than the other four because somehow he seems more, but I can't look away because if I do then I won't know where he goes. And I need him to be going.
Away from me.
All of a sudden, his eyes snap open again, and my fingers fall and tighten in soft when he starts to move.
Towards me.
My body starts trembling as he leaves the water behind. I expect the shine and sparkles to fall from his skin, but bizarrely, they cling to him. Baffled, I watch his skin glisten, looking bright and shiny like something rare and special polished brand-new, as he steps out onto dry land. My mouth falls open as I realise that they aren't part of the pool, but part of him.
He's shining.
And for a moment, that startles me enough to forget about his nakedness… that's until the sparkling starts to amplify what's so clearly there, outrageously shoving everything into my face.
I have to look away then.
It's so… wrong. So… unnatural.
Abruptly flooded by memories of the hush, I force my body to unstick and start scrambling backwards. I'm looking to the side of me, so I can't tell if he's actually coming towards me or not, but the idea that he could be is enough. Too much.
My back hits something solid.
Eyes wide at the very first substantial thing I've encountered since being here, my head whips around as far as it can go. I see something deep red before I realise that it doesn't really matter unless it's the Thing and if it is I can come back for it as soon as –
My head spins as I attempt to get my bearings, and then I scream.
OoOoOo
OoOoOoOo
OoOoOo
Quiet conversations, hushed conversations, empty conversations. I was used to the dull inflect of speech; we conversed… it was just what we did. But giggling, laughing, sighing, screaming?
I never thought I'd do any.
The sound I let out, the scream, isn't as shrill or high as I expect. The dryness of my throat makes it splutter, makes it weak and hoarse. In the end, it peters out almost as soon as it starts, ending with about a hundred coughs.
Through watery eyes, I watch the figure so near me wince and recoil, and wish I was able to hold it for longer. Maybe it would have sent Them away all together.
But the shining-him barely backs up any. He's eye-level, because he's on his hands and knees, and my heart skitters around in my chest when he starts inching closer. I let out an involuntary shriek when his hand suddenly encloses round my ankle, and I quickly yank my legs tight towards my body.
"D-d-don't – " I want to say, don't touch me, but my lips are trembling too much to get the words out.
His head cocks to the side as his gaze fixes on mine, before drifting to my mouth. Paralysed, my insides revolt at the sight of his odd eyes. They're coloured in a way I've never seen, like… like green and gold splashed together. Up close, the facets glinting on his skin form rainbows of colour, over and over again, shooting off every which way. And he's too near. I can feel the zing and pop and sizzle of his body coming too close to mine, and it's making my skin rise in a way it never has before.
Too much.
I stop looking at him. Have to.
I drop my head into my knees and tighten my arms around my legs. I can feel the solid sturdiness against my back, but now I find myself wishing for soft. I feel trapped.
Go away, I think. Oh please, go away.
Soft noises suddenly break the stifled air, making my shaking increase ten-fold. I don't know what it means, that gentle murmur, and I don't want to know. I wish I had a badge or something to show, to make Them understand that I wasn't here for –
Touch.
My body seizes as I feel the heat of something very real come into contact with my neck – one of the only parts of me that isn't covered. Lungs aching with the breath I won't let out, I feel the expanding of his chest against my legs as he breathes in deeply, the resounding trembles on his skin that after-shock mine.
He lets out another noise again – this one throatier, longer.
A moan.
Fear prickles at my scalp, and my palms grow damp with sweat as I feel his nose drift up from my neck to behind my ear. He breathes so, so deeply, and then his fingers are sliding up like the water he was just in slid along his skin. They catch on my hat, which is suddenly just gone, before sinking into my hair.
Too much.
Everything in me short-circuit-overloads at all of that feeling. I can count the number of times I've been touched in my lifetime on one hand. We just don't do it. We don't do it.
So finally unfreezing, I yank my head up so fast it hits hard on the solid behind me. My vision swims for a minute as I register the pain, but I don't give it a chance to disappear before I'm shoving him away from me, not registering the look of hurt on his face as I finally run-trip away from him.
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A/N: Well, Bella's having an eventful first day, isn't she?