They met at the wild oak. Eyes glistening, breathing laboured and voices soft and sweet. Everyone knew, but to them, this was a secret. The exciting, thrilling kind of secret that gave you clammy palms, a giddy, shaky edge and a nervous tinge to your voice.
The kind of secret that you had to tell everyone about.
Shots tore through the hues of an innocent blue sky, bullets aimlessly slicing into an iridescent background, leaving scattered clouds helpless and separated as gushings of liquid blue rushed to fill their places.
"Aren't you coming?" A girl asked expectantly.
"To get shot?"
"Well, why not?" She teased.
A chuckle. "I have things to live for."
"Such as?"
The boy scratched at the back of his head.
"Well, I guess i used to anyway..before the war.."
"I thought so." The girl smiled.
"Well, what about you? What do you live for?"
"Well.."
Leaning against the monstrous tree that seemed to tower over everything, she bit her thumb.
"I live for everything."
"Everything?" The boy was puzzled, eyebrows threaded as he looked at her.
"I think so." The girl nodded.
"Why's that?"
"Well if i wasn't here, who would be here to look after you?"
"Hey, i can look after myself." The boy picked at the chunky roots of the tree that portruded from the floor as agile strong fingers, holding the ravenous thing securely in place.
"Don't do that."
The boy stopped.
"Why not?"
"What's it done to you?" The girl apologetically stroked the trunk with her fingers, finding it to be warm and mossy at her palms.
"Well, nothing." Confused, the boy shrugged his shoulders.
"I never understood why people had to hurt things that hadn't done anything to hurt them." The girl sighed.
"It's just a tree."
"And what would happen if there were no trees?"
"Well..I guess then we'd all be dead."
Toying with a crimson leaf between her fingers, she stared at its torn edges and wondered how far it had fallen from its original place up in the canopy.
"Then be nice to the trees."
Sighing, the boy heaved himself up from the floor.
"We don't have long, you know."
"I know." He replied.
"My 'wedding' day." The girl spat.
"I'm sorry, do you have cold feet?" The boy inspected her white dress, the hem flowing and rippling at her ankles.
"As if I had a choice." She grimaced.
"I would walk with you but seriously, your people have guns."
"I understand." She smiled once more, concern hazing her eyes. "Where are you going to go?"
"Oh, just somewhere far." The boy smiled, eyes hinting at his sadness.
"I want you to have something."
The girl reached back into her hair to retrieve a golden jewelled hair comb, the dark tresses cascading over her shoulders.
"I couldn't." He looked away from her.
"You're mistaken in thinking that I'm giving you a choice."
She held his gaze as she threw the metallic marvel that landed with a thud at his feet, only looking away when she saw bullets etching lines into the heavens once more. Hitching up her dress, she turned on the balls of her feet revealing them to be dirtied and bare as she made towards the monstrous roar that seemed to make the clouds cave in on themselves.
As he watched her running away, he could only wonder how it was he who discovered such an amazing creature under such unlikely circumstances. Although today may have seemed like it was over, there was always a next time, and every night that he willed himself to sleep he seared it into the shallow walls of his consciousness that nothing would last forever.
