Remember for the Both of Us [COMPLETED]

20: Preparations

The day was spent full of gathering supplies, distributing weapons, and fights between Newt and a boy named Frankie, who had elected himself leader of the boys who were staying. "You can't take that!" he said. "You have to leave us with something!"

"You only have to last five days," Newt would snarl, but he'd dump a couple apples out of the bag or drop a knife or three. 

I grabbed my pack, and filled it with a couple granola bars, and an apple. I wouldn't need the food after we got out. I wondered what WICKED would do to me. Maybe have Gally stick me with a knife, get carried away by a Crank, run over with the bus. I doubted I'd make it to the shelter with the Flat Trans.

The Flat Trans... An idea started to churn in my mind, but I pushed it away for the moment.

I strapped a machete to my waist, and a knife to my thigh. Pitifully small in comparison to Grievers. If I was caught up in open combat, I was as good as dead. Evasion was my best weapon.

We were going to leave in the morning, but we also helped set up feeble defenses for the boys staying behind. They wouldn't last a day, I knew. Would WICKED pick them off one by one after we left? Or would they flood the Glade with Grievers until they had ripped apart anything that had moved?

Well, after this was all over, WICKED would have the map for betrayal. I'd give them plenty of that.

I felt a hand on my arm. It was Newt. He looked flushed, breathless. "Hey," he said. "Can I talk to you?"

I smiled slightly. "You already are."

"I mean in private."

I shrugged. "Okay."

We walked into the Deadheads. Evening was approaching, and the path under the trees was dim. I stumbled over a root and he steadied me, hand trailing down my arm, touch sending shivers down my bare skin. We stopped in a clearing, and he leaned back against a tree nonchalantly. I couldn't help but stare for a second, and my heart hurt as I realized what I had lost. Tall and lanky, with thin, muscular limbs. Ruffled blonde hair, and blue eyes that... were looking right back at me. 

He seemed so untouchable in that moment.

"Hope," he whispered.

"What?" I asked.

He held out a hand, smiling at me sadly. I walked up to him, eyes asking a question. He nodded affirmation, and I placed my hand in his. He turned our hands so our palms were pressing together, as if against a wall. My breathing hitched as he wrapped his fingers around mine, letting them fall to our sides. With his other hand, he brushed back the hair from my face, sweeping it all over one shoulder. 

"Newt," I breathed, barely able to form coherent words, barely able to think. "What are you doing?"

He stood up from the tree, hands on my shoulders. "We might die tomorrow," he murmured, close, so close, oh-too-close, blue eyes turning gray in the dim light. "And if we do, I don't want to regret anything." His voice was low, intoxicating.

Slowly he turned me, my feet stumbling over the uneven ground, pressing my back against the tree. I reached out, hands grabbing his shirt at the shoulders, fabric squeezed between my fingers. His hands slid to my face, cupping it gently. I looked up at him, looking down at me. He leaned down his forehead against mine, and I bit back a sob. I miss you, I wanted to say, but he wouldn't understand. He could never understand.

He kissed me, softly, with all the passion of anguish. His lips were gentle, and I felt it everywhere. My heart beat faster, and I kissed him back, blindly, hoping to forget all the pain of this life as he pressed me against the tree. I wrapped my arms around his neck, pulling him closer. His hands were on my waist, burning--

He pulled back, gasping for air, and I looked at him, shocked, eyes wide. 

Newt kissed me. Newt kissed me. Newt kissed me. Newt kissed me!

He leaned in again, uncharacteristically bold, and just barely brushed his lips against mine, light as butterfly's wings. "I love you," he whispered against my lips, and ironically, those were the words that sent me crashing back into full reality.

I shoved him away, harsher than I'd intended to. Tears filled my eyes, and the same fog that had clouded my brain cleared from his eyes, leaving him standing there. Just a boy. A broken boy. "I'm sorry," I choked out. "I'm sorry, but I can't do this." His eyebrows furrowed, and hurriedly I added, "Right now. I can't do this right now."

"You--you don't--" 

I didn't even need to escape the Maze to betray him. It's happening right now.

"I do, Newt. I do!" I bit my lip. I needed a convincing lie, and quickly. "It's just..." My mind was blank. No, don't fail me now! "What if you die? What am I supposed to do now that you've said you love me. What am I supposed to do after our--" I broke off, a deadly sense of finality ringing in my head. One more day. We'll get out of the Maze or die trying, and after that, well...

I knew what would happen. So I said the fateful words that I knew he'd hate, breaking his heart along with mine. "I can't get attached," I said, looking him dead in the eyes through the film of tears.

I'd said it to him once before, and his reaction was the same now.

"I don't want to get attached, Newt. We'll all end up forgetting sooner or later, so what's the point?"

He was pale, a deathly pale, anger replacing the desire in his eyes. I wanted to apologize, tell him it wasn't my fault, that it was the Chancellor making me do these things. "Get attached..." he trailed off. "Like I'm a puppy or some pet? I couldn't stop myself from feeling this way if I tried. Is it wrong that before I might die I wanted to kiss the girl I loved, and let her know how I feel?" He used "love" like a weapon, and I flinched away from it. "I guess so. It's obvious you haven't been here very long," he spat. "A real Glader wouldn't think that way. A real Glader knows that any day, any moment, we could all be torn from this fragile life. You're so spoiled. You think you can afford to not get attached? Fine. I'll leave you to your delusions, if it comforts you in the face of death."

I didn't even head back out to the Glade. I just curled up, on the cold, hard ground, and fell asleep, to a dark abyss where not even the yells of dying boys could wake me.