Percabeth One-Shots

Love Me Not

3rd POV

It's beautiful. The many lights that fill our sky. With their different colors, they bring joy to all. It happens every year, on that one day. She can see them from her window. The trees block most of them, by the light and sound power through. The people of her small, small town Hawthorne, gather to see these magnificent lights. In the park, where kids of all ages play soccer, baseball, and basketball. The sound, it's like bombs bursting in air. It's sometimes like bullets, when kids play with the small ones.

A single tear makes its way down her petite face, down the curve of her cheek, to drip from her chin. She cannot leave her home, not even to run to that park, the park that is so close to her home. She watches out the window, the faded colors clinging to the night sky. Reds, blues, greens, purples. It's a beauty that comes once every year. More tears come.

She wants to see the fireworks.
______
He hates this. The booming, the faded colors. They are horrible and represent a deep sadness, that's buried within him.

He hates this day, that comes every year. He hates that people celebrate this day. Why, when it brings so much sorrow to his family? His stepfather cries, so many tears run down his face. His little sister pulls on his shirt, begging him to take her to see the lights. Every years it's the same answer. No.

It's this day that his mother died. The one person he thought he'd always have, gone. She loved the lights. When they used to go watch as a family (before his sister) she'd laugh as the reds and blues lit her face. Point out the best ones, and take photos of them. Memories for them to cherish later.

They'd go to the pool, and then have a neighborhood barbecue to celebrate this glorious day. They adults would hand out glow sticks, and poppers. One kid got so excited, that he accidentally drank the acid of the glow stick.

No more glow sticks after that.

He remembered playing with Paola, his babysitter, as she taught him the song. It's very important to our history, she would say. Even though he was a bad singer, he learned the song. On this day he would quietly sing it. Just to keep the memory going. To stop the tears that flowed down his face.

His old girlfriend, loved fireworks. Her father, after getting a permit, would send them flying into the sky, in a display of magic. She would run around the lawn, pretending to chase after them. She would plead him to join her games, but he always refused making stupid excuses. She would sigh, and turn back to her game, trying to put him out of her mind.

They broke up the next day.

It's not that he always hated fireworks. He used to love them. Adore them. So much, that he wanted to set one off himself. He had so many pictures from last years of watching this sky display. He had taped them to his wall.

Key word: Had.

After her death, after the funeral, after the many tears that left his body, he ran to his room, ripping off the pictures. He tore them off, getting cuts over his hands, but he didn't care. He ran back out of their house, a match in his hand.

He threw them down, and lit the match. He threw that down. His memories, their memories, gone. He hated this day.

•~•~•~•~•~•
They met at the park. They'd seen each other around school, but she was smart and in all honors classes, while he was in regular ones.

Finally, he'd relented and taken his sister to see the fireworks.

She ran out of the house, sneaking to the park to see the fireworks.

"Hey, watch it!" She yelled, rubbing her head.

"Why don't you, huh?" He retorted, rubbing his own skull. His sister was trying not to laugh.

She rolled her eyes and got up, brushing the dirt from her ripped jeans. No she did not buy them ripped, she was just very clumsy. "Whatever."

She turned and walked away, heading towards the soccer field. Almost the whole town was sitting on the grass, looking at the sky above them. All lights were shut off, the only source coming from above. A boy handed her a flag, and she twirled it between her nimble fingers. As the show started, her mouth dropped, a carefree expression resting on her features.

He didn't care where they sat. He was gonna be on his phone the whole time anyway. His was watching where they were stepping, just letting his sister lead.

"Here," she said. He nodded and plopped down.

"Hey!"

His head snapped up to see the girl he'd bonked heads with. Oh his sister was evil. He looked at the ground, and saw that his water bottle, a hard metal container, had fallen on her dainty hand.

"Sorry," he muttered and moved it away. She said nothing, and turned her attention back to the sky. His sister followed her actions.

His phone never left his pocket.

His eyes never left her face.

He watched as the showers of colors rained on her face, making it seem like she was blue and green and pink and yellow. Her face brightened like a child's, her eyes following the patterns that made their way across the night above them.

"Didn't anyone ever tell you that it's rude to stare?" She asked, an eyebrow raised.

He gaped, embarrassment flooding through him. "I- oh shut up."

Calm down, he thought. She is just a girl. It's not like she's gonna judo flip you or something.

She laughed, and fell back into the grass. His eyes watched her only, despite what his mother had taught him.

Sure, the fireworks were pretty. But he knew something more beautiful.

Maybe, he thought. Maybe I could like Fourth of July again.

________
Happy belated birthday America.