Hey, Cruel World - (Marilyn Manson)

Stop, Hey, What's That Sound?

  I felt Twiggy sit up and crawl his way across the bed heavily, onto the other end, and heard him open and shut the door, and the shower turn on in the bathroom. I could tell by the way Zim was breathing that he was no longer asleep. I shifted towards him a bit, to where no one would feel me move, my back still facing Zim's. I reached my arm behind me and was glad to find his hand, eyes closed and back to him. I squeezed it lightly, knowing he'd know what I meant, before I let go again and smiled to myself, the two of us pretending that we were asleep once more.

  After a while of laying there, I saw through my slit eyes, Ginger get up and get dressed, leave the room, and Marilyn follow suit. They shut the door again as to not "wake" Zim or me up with their noise from the next room. I knew Ginger would go straight to cooking us all breakfast as he usually did. That was sort of his specialty.

  Once I knew they were all out of the room for sure, I rolled over easily and faced Zim's back. He'd felt me move, and did the same, so that I was eye to eye with him, staring into his beautiful green eyes, so intelligent and kind-looking. Neither of us had spoken to each other, or the guys, since Zim had kissed me in his car the night previous. Not that there was anything wrong between any of us, we just needed a chance to talk again in private, away from them. They hadn't sensed anything when we'd come through the door the night before as we'd yawned and gone straight to bed. I smiled softly at Zim.

  "What does this mean for us?" I trusted that he knew what I was speaking of, he wasn't a stupid guy by far. He would understand. I counted his slow and almost silent breaths, and watched his plain, black t-shirt rise and fall on top of his thin chest. He took a moment of thought before he spoke.

  "It means I want you to be my girlfriend," he said, and without my consent, my eyes widened the smallest bit. I tried to hold back a smile, but couldn't, and let myself at least give him a small one. "But I need to talk to you about all of it first. There are rules."

  I tried then to hold back a frown. I didn't want him to change his mind suddenly...I prayed that was not what he was doing then, getting my hopes up and then deciding he'd rather not. I nodded, not showing my thoughts on my expression, waiting for him to continue.

  "You're smart and I know you know that what we're doing is illegal. You're fifteen, I'm fourty-four. That usually doesn't happen. I don't even know why yet, that I want to do this, that I want to be with you, and I don't want to hurt your feelings by saying so, I just need to be honest with you. I don't know why I'm beginning to have feelings for a fifteen-year-old girl...most fifteen-year-old girls are immature and don't know anything about love at all and would be a waste of time. Again, that's nothing towards you...if it was, then I wouldn't be having this conversation with you now, or having the feelings I have for you. I just do have them, and I want to be with you. I know you're older and more mature mentally than the others your age...you don't seem fifteen to me."

  I knew he wasn't trying to hurt my feelings and I understood where he was coming from. Most other girls my age, I knew, were immature and usually pretty stupid when it came to what they thought they knew about "love." They'd date a guy, a heartless player for a week, and already think it was the love of their life and that they'd soon be married, when the guy had "other plans" altogether, and when he dumped her, she'd be ruined. I had never been that way...I honestly had no plans for getting married any time soon, it was a ridiculous thought. I didn't want Zim to not care for me though because of my age, in the beginning when I hadn't even felt that way for him, I'd thought he just thought I was immature...but with the current situations, I wanted to prove otherwise completely.

  "As it is illegal, and I'm sort of going to be going on tour in the near months, we have to do all we can then, at that time, to keep it a secret. I've never had much publicity, you probably know, but I do have fans still, and they will be very aroused and exstatic at the announcement that I'm back with Manson. During that time when it's the biggest news, we can't be see with each other the way lovers are seen. When we know we're completely alone, great, but other than that...word gets out that you and I are together, I'll be arrested and who knows what will happen, and you'll be discovered."