Take It All Away

The gun went off.

He winced.

He knew it was just a warning shot, but it may as well as have torn through his chest.

"You lied to me!" her hands shook as tears tracked down her cheeks and slipped from her quivering chin. He used to dry her tears, but now it seemed he was the cause of them.

"Nothing could be further from the truth, Mandy," he tried to reason with her.

"You never cared about me at all," her slender shoulders shook in the cool night air, and he longed to wrap his arms around her, but the 9mm pistol still waved dangerously in her untrained hand.

"Everything I did was to protect you," he clenched his jaw against the breaking of his own heart.

"No, Felix! If you did, why did you – you..." she hiccoughed and sniffed, "—kidnap me?" she pinned him with her bright blue gaze. The gaze that matched his cop's uniform, she had always been fond of pointing out.

"That man was dangerous. He was not right for you, and I wasn't going to sit back and watch you get hurt."

"But I'm an adult now, I can make my own decisions," her voice faltered even as she repeated the common sentiment of young people her age.

Why could no one else see the sense he lived by? Should he just let her slip away with a few stupid decisions? "Mandy, I care about you more than you know. I love you, I..." his voice broke with heavy emotion. "Just please, give me back my gun, and come with me.... Come back to me," he pleaded with his best friend, the usually confident and self-assured woman who seemed more scared and confused than ever before.

She lifted her hand and met his dark brown eyes. "Here." He took the pistol and re-holstered it. "But we're over," she took a step back, and turned.

As she walked away, her long blond hair covering the mask of emotions on her once-vibrant face, he felt like he'd lost the most important fight he'd ever faced. All those times she'd held his hand and whispered secrets in his ear...all those times they'd walked through the corn fields and picked apples in her grandma's orchard, making plans and planning dreams... They all disappeared like the sound of her footsteps, the echoes fading like the faint beats of their hearts – once in sync, now faltering out of time.

He wanted to give her everything, wanted to be her everything... yet she took it all away. 

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Awarded 2nd place in a contest for writing a story based on a song.
Song title: Take It All Away
Artist: Owl City
Contest organisers: Ithildaeforever GadSul stringslady OrganWorker