Four days after his awakening, Sophie came straight out of school, slamming the door open which sent startles through Kage and Lisa, of which both had been resting. She bawled out onto his chest leaving Kage in an awkward position as his eyes were spared between his sister and this new arrival. In a not too subtle skip, Lisa pushed open the door exiting from the room, winking as she went.
"I was so worried. Why didn't you tell me where you went? My friend and I were looking all over the place for you two." Her words persisted but Kage realized that he hadn't called her. He hadn't even checked to see if she was safe. Sophie did not once that night appear in his head. It was an odd thing for someone as adept in memory as him to mistakenly forget. For a moment his mind even tricked him into forgetting about the girl, but why? Why had such a rejection occurred in his body?
"Why didn't you tell me where you were going?" Her mascara streamed down her cheeks in black drools. She appeared as a sad clown having failed its final performance.
Kage opened his mouth to tell the truth. How she was not a worry to him. That they should end this before it went further. Instead, a phantom grip choked the words from existence. In that time, he was about to do something unspeakable. How foolish of him, he enjoyed being in the presence of Sophie. She was everything, she was right for him. He even lov- …
'What was I thinking there?'
Why would he ruin such happiness?
"Maybe… you just don't care about me."
Kage took her by the chin and was startled by the lack of pressure he felt through the glove on his skin, a matter to investigate later. "I… I care about you. But I don't know why I didn't look for you myself. I just caught up with everything, I'm sorry I didn't try to contact you. I assumed you would be safe, It's a mistake I will never make again." He could not hold her stare so threw his sight to the window at some stray birds flying for cover from the sprinkling snow. Little time passed before he experienced the breath from between sobs and the flutter of her coat shimmying against her shirt, turning to go.
"Wait!" He reached but nothing responded to him. Casting his sight back he saw that he indeed grabbed her by the buckle on her coat.
She held her back to him, emitting nothing in reaction.
"I've never done this before… A long while I was sick having myself and only Lisa." Sophie bit her lip adjusting her glasses several times so that the weakness of her expression would not be exposed. A tick. A tick that told the uncertainty as well as cautiousness she believed in his story. To her this was an excuse, not an explanation.
Maybe it was. No one else knew about it all. Lisa least of all and Daniel the second best to Gan had little more than a clue. The hospital, William, Father Bentley, his own condition, accompanied by the treatment received that has made him no longer that thing that was. Yet, Sophie left a burning desire to spew it all out. She had to be understanding. If not…
'Then would there be anyone else?'
Could he have deluded himself into believing a false tale that he was not alone? A wayfaring stranger may stumble upon his shell and adhere to its words long enough to conjure an opinion of its own?
Perhaps none existed here, and the rest were long gone.
Then again, he returned to scripture. No one can be trusted under the prospect of the Lord. They wound each other and are communicated by evil at turns unexpected. Corrupting good and morals in relationships that are best ceased before furthered.
Yet, Kage was so very tired.
His head crashed onto her back, his newly grown hair had sprouted down the center of his back laden with muck and grease as a lack of bath plagued his form. The strands tarped over his face saving him from the mask he wished to never touch again. She was short. So short and frail, he thought, beneath this covering was a body uneven and crude but made from a sturdy material he had never seen. It was not a natural or even primitive beauty that crept inside, but one from mistakes made with the promise of resolve. A promise that would be broken countless more times shaping the person possessing it.
If he could, he would trace the scars along her scratched stomach. Kage would want to feel something he had no right in having.
"I don't understand these things. If I were to touch you with my hands you would burst into nothingness. Every second, every millisecond I spend awake is deep in thinking over my movements. There's very little that can hold me down from those thoughts…
I can't do this, but I still need you." His hands crept closer, tightening along her stomach as they held with gentle touch of her figure. It was the closest he may ever get to possessing something truly for himself. All his life that gnawing feeling as the mask would surely come to replace and destroy him. It was a barrier to save those around him yet when worn it tore at his psyche. Then, there in the midst was the deeply exhausting effect which he wished to toss away.
"I sometimes see the look of my friends and wonder whether they are truly there. If I'm not stuck inside of some nightmare waiting to lunge at me from the depths when I am happy.
However, these last few months have shown me something else. I want to believe in what's happening here. So desperately that it hurts. Please… wait and stay by me. I don't want to be alone anymore." The air stilled at his begging declaration. It was as if the world had ceased its spinning, now placed in the palm of God as Sophie contemplated the answer given to her. It was one that she felt lost in.
One more step away from this person and she could stay 'normal'...
"Yeah, I can do that." Kage perked up letting the hair slide across his right eye partially blocking the view up her spine. "I haven't ever really had someone else I've cared like this for. A few girlfriends but they probably don't count." She had begun twirling her hair.
Turning around, Sophie returned the embrace, stuffing her cheek beside his. "You may not get to feel it with your hands, but hopefully this is good enough." Before he could ask what she was talking about, Sophie brushed the tip of her lips to his.
'Cherry… Sweet like cherries.'
Dumbfounded with a mouth agape, goosebumps crawled up his body. But, within that chill a blooming warmth enveloped his soul. Warming tides came evermore as he stole the image of Sophie's eyes. Eyes which shot the flavor forward, stealing his mind. When her lips had touched his own there was a deep crevice in her lower one. It was an unnatural cut created with a memory attached to it.
As their lips parted, Sophie spoke not a word as she dashed across then back out the room hiding her own nervousness until she was far gone from the object of her desires. Out in the hallway, she stuck to the wall rapidly slapping her cheeks turning the skin raw which left the door open for the cause of the unending redness. The heels to her boots clacked on the floor then stopped momentarily as she hopped to the side giving a jubilant snap where the heels collided in midair. Sadly, she was not able to stick the landing so tripped to her knees.
"Ow." She muttered.