//------------------------------// // Chapter 8: But I Know My Babies They Will Be Fine // Story: Heaven’s Not Too Far Away // by Godslittleprincess //------------------------------// “What do you mean you’re not playing at the dance?” a muscular, mint-haired drummer, Brawly Beats, shouted at Flash. “You’re our lead,” pointed out a sunglasses-wearing bass player, Ringo. “If you don’t play, we don’t play.” Flash and his bandmates were standing in the middle of one of the hallways in CHS. The last bell of the day had rung, and the three of them were discussing the next big social event of the year, the Lassie Horsens Dance. “Guys, I know that you’ve been looking forward to playing at all the dances this year, but I just can’t. I’m not even sure if I’ll be going,” Flash explained. “I’m sorry.” As Flash began to walk away, Brawly called to him, “Your mom’s been gone for two months already. Just man up and get over it.” Flash stopped in his tracks. He clenched his fists as his breath became heated and rapid. He turned around and gave Brawly a terrifyingly angry look. “My answer,” Flash calmly replied to the drummer as his ears turned red, “is still no.” He turned around and stomped away still seething. When Flash reached his locker, he found a certain bespectacled girl waiting there for him. “Twilight,” Flash greeted as his previous anger at Brawly vanished. “What are you doing here?” “I, umm,” Twilight began, wringing her hands and averting her eyes. “I,” she took a breath and forced herself to face the guitar player. “I wanted to ask you if you would like to go to the dance with me.” Time seemed to stop for Flash as his mind replayed Twilight’s last sentence. His heart raced as his palms began to sweat. “I,” he started, the corner of his mouth beginning to turn up. “I’d love to, but—,” he looked away from Twilight as his smile vanished. “BUT?! What do you mean ‘but’?! She just asked you to go to the dance with her!” Rainbow Dash’s voice could be heard coming from behind Flash. Flash turned around and saw all six of Twilight’s closest friends watching the two of them. Rainbow Dash gave a sheepish grin as the other five girls glared at her before using her super speed to dash away. The other five looked back at Flash and Twilight in embarrassment before they each scattered into a different hallway. Flash sighed in annoyance before turning back to Twilight. “Twilight,” he said to her, “I, I don’t think I’m going to the dance.” “Oh,” Twilight replied as her face fell in disappointment. “It’s not that I don’t want to go. It’s,” Flash sighed, pressing the palm of his hand to his forehead, “complicated.” Twilight’s face softened as she reached out and placed her hand on Flash’s arm. “Are you missing your mom again?” “Is there somewhere private where we can talk?” Twilight smiled knowingly as she took Flash by the hand. There was something about her and Flash holding hands that felt right. Flash’s hands were rough and strong yet still tender and warm, much like Flash himself, and holding those hands made her feel, for lack of a better word, safe. “Come on,” she said to him as she began to lead him by the hand. “I think there’s a few empty tables in the school library.” When both Twilight and Flash were sure that they were alone, Flash finally admitted to her, “Yes, yes, I’m missing my mom again.” Flash hung his head in embarrassment, completely oblivious to the smile Twilight was giving him. He stared up at the glass on the library’s ceiling as he rambled. “I know. I know. My mom’s been gone for two months. I should be used to not having her around. I should have moved on already and gotten over it, and I have,” Flash paused, realizing that what he had spoken might not have been the complete truth. “Well, for the most part,” he clarified. “I mean, I have gotten used to her being gone, but sometimes, sometimes,” he let out a groan and turned towards Twilight, still oblivious to her true feelings despite the fact he was looking right at her face. “Sometimes, I just get days when I just start missing her more than usual, and I’ve been getting them more often as the dance has been getting closer. And,” Flash took a breath. “And I don’t know why.” Twilight put her hands on top of his, and when she did, Flash finally noticed that Twilight was smiling at him. “Wait, you’re not mad at me?” he asked her, raising an eyebrow in confusion. “No,” Twilight replied, still smiling. “Why would I get mad at you for missing your mom? I mean, your grandfather’s been gone for two years, and you still get days when you miss him more than normal, don’t you?” “Well, yes,” Flash conceded, “yes, I still get those days. Maybe not as often, but I still get them.” “What I’d like to know is why the dance is making you miss your mom so much,” Twilight pointed out. “Was there anything that she used to do before a big dance? Or anything she used to say?” Flash smiled as he recalled the memory. “Well, there was one thing that she always did,” Flash recounted. “Before I would leave the house to go to a dance, Mom used to always get choked up seeing me in a suit. I don’t know why, but she just did.” He frowned as he continued, “I used to get so annoyed when she would do that, but now, I’d give anything to go through that again. She used to go on and on about how I get more handsome and more like a man every year, and then she’d say, ‘If I’m getting this emotional over a school dance, I don’t know how I’ll be able to hold myself together when you get married.’” Flash felt tears welling up in his eyes as he finished telling Twilight his tale. He pulled one of his hands away from Twilight and rubbed his eyes. Looking down on the tabletop, he said, “Well, there’s my answer. The dance is probably making me think of all the big moments that my mom will never be a part of anymore.” More tears filled his eyes as he continued to talk, “She’s not going to be around when I graduate or turn 18 or leave for college or get married or have kids.” Flash looked up and met Twilight’s eyes. Her eyes were glistening too. “I’m sorry,” he apologized, pulling his other hand away. “I didn’t mean to upset you.” “Oh no,” Twilight objected, pulling out a packet of tissues to wipe her eyes with. “You didn’t upset me. It’s just…,” she trailed off, carefully choosing her words. “It’s just that that’s a lot of events to not have your mom around for.” “I guess back when she was still alive, I just sort of assumed that she’d always be there for them.” “Oh Flash,” Twilight said as she got up and hugged him from behind. “I, I don’t know how Heaven works, and even if I had a way of finding out for sure, I won’t be able to prove it, but I’d like to think that she’d be able to see all those big events even if she can’t actually be around for them.” Flash looked up at her and smiled. Twilight smiled back before releasing him and returning to her seat so that the two of them were once again face to face. “Look, Flash,” she said as she once again held his hand. “If you don’t feel ready to go to the dance, then I won’t make you come with me. If you’re not going, then I won’t either.” “But what about your friends?” Flash asked her. “Wouldn’t they want you to go to the dance anyway?” “Yes, they would,” Twilight conceded. Then, her eyes lit up as an idea entered her mind. “But there’s actually one place I’d like to go to instead of the dance that I think you’d be more than happy to take me to.” Flash looked at her quizzically as he wondered where Twilight would possibly like to go to instead of the dance. It was the night of the Lassie Horsens Dance, and Twilight was wearing a dark navy-blue dress with stars on the skirt. However, she wasn’t at the school gymnasium surrounded by well-dressed teenagers dancing the night away. Instead, she was standing by the railing at the cliff clearing at Stardust Point enjoying a view of the city against the night sky. Flash stood next to her, dressed in a suit with a sky-blue shirt and a red tie. “I still can’t believe that you chose to come up here with me instead of going to the dance,” Flash said to her. “I mean, if you didn’t want to go dateless, you could have just asked someone else.” Twilight took him by the arm and leaned her head against his shoulder. “I didn’t want to go with anyone else. I wanted you.” Flash and Twilight looked at each other, giving each other affectionate smiles. “You guys better not be kissing,” a young male voice called to them. The two older teens turned around with annoyed looks on their faces and saw First Base sitting on top of the picnic table with Spike on one side of him and an open bag of pepperoni jerky and an MP3 player attached to a pair of speakers on the other. In his hands, he held a pump-action water gun with Shining Armor’s name written in black permanent marker. Earlier that evening, when Flash had gone to pick up Twilight, Shining Armor had approached Flash’s car while Velvet was occupying her daughter and her daughter's date by taking an excessive number of pictures and gushing about how perfect they looked together. Shining was holding a fully loaded and cold pump-action water gun in his hand. He knocked on the back passenger door, getting First Base’s attention. Base looked up and saw the young man motioning for him to roll the window down, so he did. “If you see them kissing,” Shining said to the younger teen, passing him the water gun through the open window, “shoot ‘em.” Then, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a $20 bill which he also gave to First Base. “Yes, sir,” Base eagerly agreed, accepting his payment. Back in the present, First Base frowned at Twilight and his brother while pumping the water gun threateningly. At least, the action would have been threatening if the pump didn’t squeak. Flash looked at Twilight and deadpanned, “Most overprotective older brothers hire spies, not hitmen.” “You were the one who volunteered your younger brother to be the DJ,” Twilight retorted. “I was going to ask Micro Chips to do it, but he got asked to the dance.” He turned to his younger brother and said to him, “Why don’t you do what I brought you for and play us a song, huh?” Base rolled his eyes as he popped a few chunks of jerky into his mouth. Then, he picked up and turned on the MP3 player. “Any requests?” he asked as he scrolled through the song list. “How about the PianoStrings cover of ‘Rewrite the Stars'?” suggested Twilight. Base found and selected the song in question before continuing to snack on his jerky. Spike watched as he snacked and whined hungrily. The boy shot the puppy a look that clearly said, “Get your own.” Flash took Twilight’s right hand in his own and wrapped his left arm around her waist while Twilight placed her left hand on his shoulder. The two slowly swayed to the music as it began to play. The music picked up, and Flash and Twilight began to spin faster, Twilight’s skirt swishing back and forth as if a cool breeze was blowing through it. Flash twirled Twilight as the chorus swelled causing the stars on her skirt to swirl into a spiral galaxy as her skirt billowed out. He twirled her a few more times before dipping her. Twilight laughed as Flash pulled her back up and caught her in his arms. She rested her head on his shoulder as she pulled him closer, delighting in how sturdy his chest and shoulders felt in her embrace. Flash turned towards her and for a while, just stared at the back of her head. Her hair now reached her shoulders, but it was still a long way from its original length. “Twilight?” he whispered into her ear. “Yes?” she whispered back, picking her head up to meet his eyes. “I,” he began. The overflow of gratitude and affection that he felt towards this girl caused the words to get caught in his throat. He swallowed a few times and continued. “I just wanted to say thank you. For everything. These past six months, well, they were hard, but they would have been a thousand times worse if you hadn’t been there for me. You, you really are someone special.” Twilight’s eyes brimmed with tears hearing Flash’s praise of her. She felt a pleasurable tingle crawl up her arms and a warmth bubbling up in her chest. No words could describe how wonderful Flash’s kind words made her feel. What Twilight did next was worth more than a million words. Twilight closed her eyes as she leaned up and tenderly pressed her lips on Flash’s cheek. His eyes widened, and his arms tightened around her pulling the two of them so close that he couldn’t tell if the racing heartbeat that he felt was his or Twilight’s. Then, he closed his eyes, drinking in the warmth of Twilight’s lips on his face. Nothing could possibly ruin this moment for either of them. “Ah!” Twilight cried out as the two of them were blasted with several sprays of cold water. When the assault finally ended, the two of them turned to see First Base giving them the smuggest of grins. “Best $20 I ever earned!” the younger boy exclaimed. Twilight and Flash shared a look with each other, clearly unamused with what Base had just done. “Maybe I should have asked Micro to DJ,” said Flash as he wrung out his tie. Twilight smirked before taking Flash’s face in her hands and suddenly pulling his other cheek towards her lips. After Twilight broke the kiss, she took a rather dazed Flash by the hand and pulled him into a run, laughing joyously as she did so. Once Base got over the shock of seeing Twilight kiss his older brother a second time, he chased after them. “Hey! You crazy kids get back here!” he yelled, running, pumping and shooting at the same time. Twilight and Flash shrieked and shouted with happiness as they unsuccessfully dodged the blasts that soaked through their clothes. Spike remained sitting at the picnic table. He tilted his head as he watched the three humans, two of them soaked to the skin, run and laugh around the clearing. However, he quickly forgot his confusion when an enticing scent hit his nostrils. Turning towards the scent, he smiled deviously at his tremendous discovery. First Base had left his jerky unattended.