noxious. // jgk

prologue

The city looked a little extra beautiful tonight. It was a clear night, with what seemed like a countless amount of stars for a city with so many man-made lights. The air was brisk, just the way I liked it. It felt soothing on my face, as if ice fairies were kissing my cheeks millions of times. All you could hear was the hum of cars zooming by and the commotion in the far distance, which is comforting in the sense that you're not alone although you constantly feel like you are. I've always felt alone, ever since my parents decided to leave me when I was 13, but I've been feeling more alone than usual lately. Maybe because my birthday's in a few days? I remember when I was little how my parents always used to buy me a huge ice cream cake...

The little girl fumbled with the freezer handle until it finally flew open to reveal a gigantic cake on the top shelf, one that would probably take her days to finish by herself. The little girl felt an ear-to-ear grin begin to form on her face as her excitement got the best of her.

A young lady, about 26 or 27, walked in interrupting the little girl's discovery and lightly gasped. The little girl turned around to face her mother and giggled loudly.

"What's that cake for, mommy?" The little girl said pointing to the cake, trying to act as clueless as possible.

"It's...for a friend." The lady replied, acting just as oblivious to the cake as her daughter was.

"Yeah right!" The girl exclaimed. "You're holding a cake for a friend on the same day as my birthday night? You're silly, mommy!"

"Well, you caught me." The lady errantly said. "Happy birthday Cora!"

The girl jumped up and down, releasing the excitement she couldn't contain anymore.

"But," the lady said, interrupting the little girl's excitement. "Before you get your cake..."

"What?" the little girl softly asked, looking concerned.

"TICKLE TIME!" the lady shouted, approaching the little girl with her hands in front of her face playfully.

The little girl's laughs became hysteric, and erratically breathing from laughing so hard.

I smiled at the thought of the old memory and relaxed my head against the brick wall behind me. I extended my feet on the ledge in front of me and began to shut my eyes to enjoy a peaceful moment: something I haven't fully experienced in years.

Mid-relaxation, i felt a figure force my feet down and a cold pair of hands slap against my eyes. Well, I guess there goes my almost full experience of relaxation.

"Guess who?" I heard a familiar voice singsong. That voice could only belong to one face, and indeed it did: Min Yoongi.

Yoongi and I have been friends since I could remember. When my parents suddenly left me and I was stuck aimlessly walking the streets of the city, he was the one who brought me in and made me feel like I was home again. Yoongi and I are 6 years apart — him being 23 and me being 17 — which was a lot to me as a 13 year old, considering I didn't talk to anyone over the age of 14. He was nineteen when he brought me in. Yoongi ran away from home when he was 16 and decided to rent an apartment with his friend, Hoseok (with all the money they could find and get, of course). Yoongi found me on a street corner with my bags, weeping about the situation with my parents. We talked for hours, just about anything other than why I was sitting on a curb crying. After finally telling him my situation, he offered to bring me to his place just to stay there. Yes, I know what you're thinking: you, a 13 year old girl, went with some weirdo to stay at his apartment? It sounds super sketchy, but I really did have a 6th sense about him; he wasn't going to hurt me, I just knew. And look at me now — I think I'm pretty okay.

"Hello, Yoongi." I smiled while taking his hands off of my face to reveal a grinning Yoongi.

"Hello Cory." I cringed at the nickname Yoongi constantly gave me.

"Question. Why do you constantly call me that knowing I despise the nickname?"

A slight smile formed on Yoongi's face, and he shrugged. I smiled at his very relaxed reply.

"Guess who's birthday is in 3 days?" Yoongi said cheerfully. Oh no, here it goes again.

Yoongi is very big on birthdays. And when I say big, I mean big. You should have seen my 16th birthday: he wasted his whole paycheck for the week on 250 balloons and a huge cake for me! I remember being so flustered when coming home from school and seeing all of Yoongi and Hoseok's hard work. If you were wondering, it took them 2 and a half hours to blow up all of those balloons.

"Yoongi, please don't do anything huge for my birthday." I sighed "I'm begging you."

One thing you should know about me is that I absolutely detest celebrating my birthday. I feel so awkward and uncomfortable whenever I have attention on me, and i hate those people who act like they've been your friend for 10 years just because you popped out of your mother's vagina on this day.

"But Cora, you're turning 18! Turning 18 is so inportant. For instance, it's your last year of high school."

He was right about that. I couldn't wait to finish high school. I really don't have a lot of friends in school. Well, technically I do, I really just don't like most of the people i talk to in school; I honestly don't even consider them friends, more like people I talk to while I'm at school so I don't look like a loser. And to top that, I've never had a boyfriend out of all the 18 years I've been living on this planet. No, it's not the worse thing ever, trust me, but it would be nice to have someone just to talk to, lay on, cry on, whatever. Just someone to feel with. But no one wants to date me, never did. Probably has something to do with the fact I'm poor and gross.

I just smiled at the thought of being able to escape from high school.

"So," Yoongi said. "What kind of cake d'ya want?"

I laughed and sighed. "I don't want anything!"

"C'mon. You know you do! Who doesn't want a birthday cake?"

"No, I feel bad. I don't want you and Hoseok wasting your money on me. Save it for stuff we actually need and not a stupid cake and balloons."

"We wouldn't be wasting our money. That cake would probably last us a good week and a half."

I chuckled at Yoongi's comment. "Fine, you can get the cake, but that's all. No balloons, no streamers, nothing else. Got it?"

Yoongi raised his arms innocently. "Alright, alright, you got it. I'm surprised you even agreed on cake."

"Shut up," I said jokingly. I stretched my hand into my cold jacket pocket until my hands met the side of my cigarette box. "You got a lighter?"

Yoongi sighed and hesitantly grabbed a lighter from his inner coat pocket. "You know, you really shouldn't do that. Your teeth will get all yellow and rotten. And when you get old, you'll get all these wrinkles. And-"

"We're all gonna die anyways," I sighed, grabbing the lighter from Yoongi's frigid hand.

After that him and I just stayed silent. It wasn't awkward silence, it was just comfortable silence. I loved the kind of silence that could be seen as sweet and not uncomfortable. I resumed to peacefully looking out into the horizon and solicitously listened to the hum of cars go by.

//

Hey, thanks for reading this!! Sorry if this part was a little boring, it was kind of just to introduce the main characters of the story. I promise the rest of this story won't be as boring and poorly written as this, it was just the prologue fjhJHDSH ok tysm for reading and stay tuned for the next part !!