Oh Love, Where Do I Fall?

[Melusine]

((Angie Cortez and Mike ‘Cowboy’ Brown now here.))

Angelina was glad that her mother had forced her to pack a raincoat. It wasn’t a pretty one, but it was doing the job to stop the rain from inserting itself in every crevice of her body. She was still wet, however. Whether it was the humidity or her sweat, she had a thin layer of liquid all over her body. At least, it wasn’t the rain.

Underneath her coat, she was just wearing a black tank top and a pair of shorts. She was still very hot, but at least she didn’t have too many layers that trapped the sweat against her skin. Her shoes were waterlogged, so she had swapped for a pair of sandals. They were doing the jobs, but she wished she didn’t have to walk around in a pair of uncomfortable shoes on murder island. She held her gun close to her as if she was carrying a baby. It wasn’t how she was supposed to hold it, but if she welded it in any other ways, it made her feel sick.

The rain wasn’t stopping.

“I’m sorry,” she looked at the plastic bag containing the bodies of the dead frogs, “I really thought that we could go back.”

“Eh, so did I.” Mike drawled out, stretching out every word as if that’d make some kinda dent in the rain. “But that’s it, y’know? If it comes, it comes.”

Maybe he should’ve felt a bit more disappointed in the whole separated from the group because of a huge-ass rainstorm business, but just as the patter of the rain was numbing his body, it almost felt as if it was starting to go all over his brain too. Had he heard gunshots out there? Maybe, maybe not.

Either way, the whole frog hunting business was, if nothing else, another thing to think about rather than like, everything else wrong with this place, which meant that it’d been the best kinda business choice. Even if it did mean his shirt was starting to stick to his skin. That part was real shorty, but if it was just a little trade off to feel just a little bit more normal, he’d take it.

He’d have to take this thing off later, but at least he’d had the flannel shirt untied and packed right back into his bags, and his cap plopped right back on his head.

Mike sighed, pulling the brim of his cap just a little further down. Least they had the little things to count on.

“I mean, we’ve got dinner, don’t we?” A little smile popped out, grin just missing the guitar. “That’s somethin’ to be happy ‘bout.

“Mhm, I guess.”

It wasn’t anything good. The frogs or toads, whatever they were they could be, were possibly toxic. Angelina just needed an excuse to get away from the group. To calm down, to be able to talk to Mike without feeling too many eyes on her. She had made a mistake.

Angie sat underneath a tree. She was glad her coat reached her legs because she wouldn’t have to sit directly on the dirty and wet ground. She let her gun fall to her side and lay her head against the bark. She looked at Mike. Her throat squeezed when she tried to talk, letting out a croak.

“I know about Ramsey.”

The rain wasn’t deafening, but it was loud enough to make her talk louder than she wanted. Angelina had officially thrown away any morals she had left. Talking about her brother’s sexuality where everyone, but especially anyone, could hear and see made her feel sick. It made her feel like she had made a terrible mistake. However, she had to continue.

“I know how you look at him and, hum,” she hugged her knees. Angelina didn’t care about getting herself wet anymore. She deserved it. “Please, if you can, make him happy.”

Angelina shook her head, letting some of her hair fall from her bun. “That’s, uh, what I wanted to talk about.” She laughed, but she wasn’t smiling. Angelina had become desperate, deplorable, but now, she was now pathetic. “I should have told you earlier.”

Angelina finally decided that living in the darkness, for whatever how long she might have in this world, wasn’t worth the comfort of others. She had held to it like a child would hold to an oath from their parents that monsters didn’t really exist. Clung to it for way too long, and ignored every sign that what she believed was deeply wrong. She tried to let it go, but now her lie was clinging to her.

“Sorry.”

Lotta things coulda come out of Mike's mouth, like a "what the fuck" or an "oh my lord" or just like, any sort of thing that would've made a helluva lot more sense than what he did say, which was:

"Ah."

Ah, because ah shit, she knew about like the whole thing, which was like gah, but good 'cause Angie was good people but also like gah, and honestly Mike wasn't super duper sure what'd happened that night but the fact that his face was turning all red, same as it did when he had a little too much guzzled down, didn't really point to a nice and clean bible study sesh or somethin' holy like that.

Rain was still pouring, right, and so it obviously made sense that some was falling right on his face, even in the rain then, right? Just a little, just a drizzle, just enough to pass right by the corner of his eye. That was it. Just Angie telling him straight up, she knew the deal, and even then, the pouring rain felt like it quieted just a bit, volume now a 5 from a 7, and it was echoing in his mind in his brain, because him? What? The fuck?

Again, couldn't say that, tried to put on his best big man face, all steady-like, exact opposite of how he really felt. Still stepped a little closer to Angie, though, spoke, voice cracking, just a little.

"I..I'll try my very best." A grin rose on his face, almost soaked in vinegar. 'Course it was when he was about to die, shit like this'd come up. He'd still try, though. And like, that was actually becoming an important word to say now.

“Thank you,” she hid her face with her hands. She felt ashamed but this wasn’t about her.

She started to cry, but she never felt happier. Her tears in the rain wouldn’t be remembered, but maybe what she would say would be. Even if their lives would end, whatever time they had spent on this earth didn’t mean nothing. Their happiness was going to be their legacy, and nobody would take that away from them. Angelina wiped her tears and looked at Mike. She smiled.

“I give you my blessings.”

((Angie and Mike continued somewhere else.))