Chapter Twenty-Three

~ Maka ~

My hands were numb. White knuckles pinching with every time I scrunched my hands into fists at my sides. Scrunching them so tight that I felt the skin at my palms threaten to snap.

Flames were spreading in my veins, and roaring towards the wounds that burned deep within my wrists. Like the adrenaline that no longer wanted to possess my body was bursting from my flesh.

My heart was hardly beating. I could only feel it stumble whenever the rain startled at my skin. Trying to surpass my flesh and singe within my fiery veins.

It was only then that I could hear the sound of a skateboard roaring somewhere in the distance. The sound of its wheels scratching at the ground, as if trying to defy the ground that rested beneath it.

~ Death the Kid ~

The park beside me sat deserted, the rain somewhat forcing it into neglect. The muddy field glistening with water drops, and the presence of the green eyed girl.

I pressed down on the tail of my board, forcing it to skid to a stop against the concrete.

She sat against my tree, arms sprawled out beside her and knees pulled close into her chest. Her wrists free from the bandages that once protected her.

Grasping my board beneath my arm, I stepped onto the field. Hearing the squeak of my DC's rub against the grass.

Her bandages lay soaked against the ground in front of me. White threads ripped apart as if she had clawed them from her arms.

Drips of blood soaking deeper into the strings, as if the devil himself had possessed a hold on it.

~ Maka ~

The grass crunched. Growing louder by the second that I remained sitting against that particular tree.

Drawn in by the specific sound I slowly turned my head to face the open space beside me.

To see his golden eyes staring at me.

~ Death the Kid ~

Quickly she threw herself from the ground. "Don't come any closer!"

As ordered, I stopped. Standing two metres away from her, but wanting to be closer.

I sighed, "Maka…"

"No," she snapped. "Don't you dare feel sorry for me."

My heart hammered drastically inside my squeezing chest.

She sniffed, "I don't deserve it."

I couldn't stop it, but I took a step closer.

"And I don't deserve you!"

My eyes widened as my heart froze. Shards of ice scratching at my insides as she wavered in front of me.

She struggled to catch her breath as she looked towards me. Her hands clutched at her chest as if she needed to hold herself together.

"I'm fine…"

I took a step closer.

She screamed, "stop!"

I took another step.

"Please," she sniffed. "I'll only end up hurting you."

I didn't care. "I won't leave you, even if you do."

She backed up slowly, trying her hardest to push herself away from me, and greaten the distance between us.

"Liz…" she stammered. "I hurt her…"

"And she deserved it."

Her teary eyes widened. Tears bleeding down her cheeks quickly, streaming like a rapid river, and shinning like the shining stars.

But as she watched me, I could only need her more than I already did.

"Don't…" I sighed. "Don't feel sorry for her, at all."

"But I do!" She yelled.

I stepped again.

She gripped at her hair. "I can't help but feel like a monster."

"It'll pass," I nodded. "I promise."

"Don't act like you know!"

My hands shook drastically at my sides. The fists that haunted my life not daring to form in any way possible, for as long as I stood there in that moment.

She stood there, watching me, the way that I watched her. The way that I always - watched her.

The only girl to make my heart stutter without touching me.

"That uncontrollable anger?" I clawed at my jeans. "Where you can hardly breathe because your hearts beating too fast?"

She gripped her chest like her heart was suffocating her. Like the distance I was slowly closing between us was taking away her will to breathe.

I bit my lip. "I have spent my entire life, believing that I'm nothing other than a monster."

I was footsteps away from touching her. Feeling her existence beneath my shaking fingertips.

"Believing, that I'm nothing."

Her tears were glistening. Like the girl inside all of the cover-ups was finally breaking free. Finally letting her guard down.

She sniffed, "stop…"

"But until the moment I met you," I shivered beneath the thundering clouds. "The moment that I first looked in your eyes…"

Blonde strands of her hair laced against her cheeks, but somewhat for the first time ever, made her everything other than broken.

She was still beautiful.

"You…" I stammered. "You made me feel for the first time ever, like something…"

She bit her lip, "Kid."

I was drawn in, drawn in towards her, everything that was her, and everything she wasn't.

She couldn't move away anymore. She couldn't escape me as I slowly moved towards her, and closed in the gap that was determined to separate the both of us, for as long as it could.

"I'm fine," she whispered, looking away.

Lacing my arm round her back, I quickly pulled her towards me.

"I'm fine!"

She slammed her breakable fists into my shoulders. Trying her hardest to defy me with everything she had, and try her hardest to escape from everything we were together.

"Please," she shivered. "I'm fine…"

I crushed her into my possession.

"Kid!"

Her tiny fists hammered all over my chest, cracking at my ribs and shattering at my collarbone.

But still I refused to let her go. Despite the pain she brought to me, I still held onto her and forced her tighter into my chest.

Until the second she stopped resisting.

"You're beautiful, Maka." I placed my hand against her head. "You are, without a doubt, the most beautiful girl I have, and will ever meet."

I felt her hands quiver at my neck, tickle at my hairline.

I didn't stop. "When I look at you, my heart stops beating."

Her heart was beating against my own, thundering at my ribs as if they wanted to twine themselves together.

She pulled away beneath me, but not in the way to say that she wanted to escape.

Her eyes met mine, glimmering like the sun and the moon combined. Like together they were beyond the most powerful thing in the world, as well as the most beautiful.

"Maka…" I whispered.

Her fingers were soft against my skin, sending little waves up and down my spine, like fireworks that only existed inside my body.

I smiled, "I love you."

She smacked her lips on top of mine, our dried wounds coming together to create something that was destructively perfect.

She made the fireworks inside me burst to life around us, as if the rain that poured was no longer rain and that of the ash, that dribbled from the fire beauties.

~ Maka ~

His arm tightened around my waist as he pulled me closer. Like he was trying to keep me from falling apart as he pressed harder onto my lips.

Everything was perfect. The rain, his lips, the fireworks.

I wasn't alone. I was anything other than alone. I was standing there, drenched in wounds as well as rain.

And caring deeply for what felt like, the first ever person, to ever care for me.