Chapter 1: Midnight

“There is none righteous, not even one;

     there is no one who understands;

     there is no one who seeks God.

All have turned away,

     they have together become worthless;

there is no one who does good,

     not even one.”

                                                                                                                                             Romans 3:10-12

     “Your reign of terror ends here Demon King.”

     “It appears so, hero. I just wished for a new world, one without discrimination… Oh, where did I go wrong.”

     “Farewell Demon King, you were my fiercest and greatest opponent of them all.”

     “Ohh Cole, you are so great and handsome and great and sexy. Ohh I love you so much. Please be with me forever!”

     “Why of course Cassie, I’ll do whatever you want, baby.”

     “Hey Cole, do you mind telling the homeless man outside to leave. He’s starting to scare away customers.”

     Ohh Cole, you sure know how to get a woman, now come here.

     “*snap* *snap* Cole, hello… Earth to Cole?”

     “Ahh! Okay… you said to go get the homeless man right? I’ll bring him right away!” I start running off towards the man sitting outside the door.”

     “No sleepyhead, tell him off! We haven’t gotten any customers in the past hour cause of him, now tell him to shoo, scram, skedaddle. I don’t care what you say just get him out, jeez.” She sure is passionate about her job. Where does she get such ambition from? She sure is a strong-powered woman, what’s not to love about those types of females!

     The homeless man in question looked like any old homeless man, with white hair, a big scruffy beard, chubby, and dirty looking everywhere. I walk outside towards the man and prepare what I plan to say in my head. Sir, can you please leave? Sir, can you please leave? Sire, can your leaf? “Sim, cab your place love?!” Ahh, I really screwed myself now. How does one mess up such a simple speech?! Is my face getting hot?! It feels hot?! Just kill me already…

     “Boy… you sure are a weird one… and what’s with that L on your neck?” I slowly start to recover from my embarrassment and decide to talk with a homeless man… is it bad that I consider this as one of my low points in life. I grin at the man. “Oh, this? It’s a birthmark, had it ever since I was born… which I guess I already said when I said birthmark…” I feel my face start to burn up again and my grin turns to embarrassment.

     “Sorry I was just curious since it didn’t seem like one to me. HAHAHA, maybe my old eyes are deceiving me.” What is this thinking about?

     “Cole can you hurry up with it already! Jeez… can’t even do the simplest of things right” she said almost in a fit of rage. Great, now I’ve gone and made her mad.

     “Got it, sorry. Well you heard her, do you think you can move, we're losing customers with you being out here.” I ask. Could you please leave sir?

     “Hmmm, you like her don’t you, boy?” he asked all sinisterly and all. I can feel my face turning red again, but way worse than the others. I glance to see if she’s looking our way, thankfully she’s on her phone. “I’d be a careful young one, girls like that don’t have relationships on their minds.” What is he talking about? He doesn’t know a thing about her and still decides to say that. I had the wrong impression of him, though he wasn’t that bad a guy but, not so much now.

     “Okay, okay, thank you for your advice. Can you please go now?” Please hurry up and go.

     “I’ll go if you give me a ten, no less.” he asked. He wants money, of course. Well, as long as he’d leave then that’s fine.

     “Okay, I got it, here. Now go, please.” I ask. Just hurry up and go already.

     “If I knew you would give it to me that easily, I would’ve asked for more. Well, be careful out there boy, you don’t know who’s out for ya. See ya, boy.” He raises his hand as he walks away, making him oddly look cool for a homeless man.

     What did he mean by Cassie not wanting to be in a relationship? Cassie would totally want to be in a relationship… but would she want to be in one with me? What better time than now to find out… right? Would she say yes? We’ve known each other for two years already, she’s got to be at least interested. But what happens if she says no? Will she hate me? Will I need to quit? Can we still be friends? Are we even friends now…? I don’t think I can go on the rest of the day with these thoughts. I should at least try, what’s the worst that can happen? Uhhh, that feels so cliche to say.

     I walk back in and see Cassie still on her phone, texting someone, probably. “Oh your back, took you long enough.”

     “Haha… ya he just didn’t want to leave, had to pay him ten bucks to scram.” Now that I think about it, I paid him in singles, do I have enough for the bus now?

     “You paid him money to leave, quite thoughtful of you, though you got scammed for ten dollars.”

     “It’s fine I only planned on using that on junk food.” This is a lie because I realize that was my bus money, it’ll probably be fine to just exchange my leftover money for singles.

     “Huh, is that so.” I think now I just have to go for it, what better time than now, right?

     “So, since I won’t be getting junk food tonight how about getting some actual food with me tonight? Then maybe after going to a fireworks show today at midnight?” I ask but already start feeling the regret on my face. 

     “Cole Davis, are you asking me out?” she asks. I can feel my cheeks getting red and sweat starting to form.

     “If that’s what it's called, then yes, y-yes I am.” Now not only my cheeks, but my whole face feels red.”

     “Sure.” Sure? Did she say sure? My face feels so hot now, wait my insides are feeling hot too now. Can that even happen? And my heart is beating so fast right now. Can she hear it?

     “Nine sound good?” I feel like my red face is ruining my cool facade.

     “Sounds perfect, just text me the details on where to meet you.” And just like that, she walks away all gracefully. Wait, was her shift over? I probably spent too much time talking to the homeless man that I lost track of time. More importantly, I need to go get ready… once my shift is over.

***

     I’m standing at the agreed-upon meeting point, but she’s not here. Maybe coming thirty minutes early was a bad idea, now I'm just starting to get cold. It’s five minutes to nine, if I get stood up then I just quit, not the biggest deal. I’ll just have to beg my landlord to extend my rent due date.

     Not… big… at all.

     “Cole? Jeez, how early did you come? Where you that excited for this?” she asked in her perfect voice as usual. There she is, she is… gorgeous. Her long black hair looks just like the night light, and her black eyes reflect the shine of the moon. Her wearing a black trench coat all buttoned up, but you can see the bottom of her dress below it. As well as her white face that matches mine (except I still have some acne), and her clear teeth that light up the sky.

     She’s just perfect.

     “C’mon let’s go before I freeze to death.” She went all out for this date, meanwhile, I came in a nice dress shirt and dress pants, which I am hating because I only wear sweatpants. My black hair that I just brushed upwards, and a face that comes off as white.

     Oh, God hasn’t forsaken me yet.

     We walk into the restaurant which was just a typical Italian restaurant you can find in most places here in Newark. We both sit in silence waiting for our table to get ready. Is she not having fun or is it just because she doesn’t feel like talking so close to strangers? Regardless, our table was ready and our waiter sat us down.

     “We’re you not a fan of Italian food? I’m sorry for assuming so.” I think she just didn’t have the heart to turn me down after she already agreed.

     “No this is fine, I just saw some of the men there eyeing me down while we were waiting.” Now that she mentions it, I heard some tsk sound behind me when we walked to our table. Now was that because she left or that I was with her?

     “Okay, well we should try not to think about them and just focus on our meal, that sounds good?” I ask still thinking I'm in bed. It would suck if she didn’t feel comfortable on our date.

     “Sounds perfect.” In relief, I sigh now that the tension in the air is gone.

     We order our food and continue to talk to each other, whether it was our family, school, childhood, or ambitions. Though I don’t remember much from my childhood nor my parents since they died when I was still young, which had seemed to kill the mood for a bit. But thankfully Cassie is good at carrying on a conversation.

***

     “Ahh, that food was good, I feel stuffed.” she said.

     “Ya but the best part is yet to come. We got an hour till the show starts and it’s a ten-minute walk, so I think we should start heading over to secure a good spot.” While that dinner date was amazing, the fireworks I know will be way better.

     “Actually from where the show is, I know a good spot to see it but we might barely make it to see the fireworks, is that fine with you?” A secret spot to view fireworks with Cassie, how can I refuse this.

     “Sure I don’t mind, even if we did show up late, it’s not like we wouldn’t be able to see them in the sky.” I sure hope that it’s somewhere romantic with nobody there, would feel like I'm in some rom-com.

***

     “C’mon let’s go, they're about to start. We can almost see the sky.” She said all excited like. When she said that she knew a spot, I wish she would have mentioned that it was on top of a cliff. Though she seems excited so all is good. Not to mention that there appears to be no one here. The perfect place to take our relationship to the next step, or would that be rushing it.

     “Ohh, I can see it, it’s… wait what happened. You can’t see the fireworks from here, all we can see are clouds.” But why, it said the weather would be clear today. Or was it because of being on top of this hill? Now that I think of it, there might have been a low chance of clouds, but being here would make those odds higher.

     Well this sucks, our date is ruined. She’ll hate me forever, and I’ll die alone. But now that I’m looking at her, she doesn’t seem to hate me. She seems happy.

     “Can you hear that? They are still doing the fireworks. Even if we can’t see them, we can just imagine how it would’ve looked, doesn’t that sound more fun?!” A sound? I didn’t hear one, was I that lost in my thoughts that I didn’t hear a loud boom. Though I am glad that she is trying to make the best of this situation.

     “Ya, I can hear it, loud and clear.” I feel that lying is the best choice rather than telling her I thought about my life flashing before my eyes.

     *Boom*

     “Okay, I think that one sounded like a star.” Hmm, I guess this does seem fun.

     “I’m not sure, I think it sounds more like a face. I’m getting the feeling it’s a skull face.” Standing here watching the “fireworks” all alone is pretty nice.

     “Wouldn’t that be scary for kids to see that?” she said which made me immediately regret my previous statement. 

     “What about a lip then, or a kissy face. Wait, that might still be child inappropriate. Ummm, hold on let me think. Ummm-”

     “Actually, I quite enjoy the sound of a kissy face.” She then looks at my face and approaches me, eyes locked and now lips too. The warm feeling of heat between our lips and the sound of the fireworks going off. It really does feel like a rom-com now. Our hearts beat so loud that we can hear the others. The warmth coming from my stomach. The inside of my mouth rejoicing. Wait, is that something that happens in these romantic scenarios.

     I brake off the kiss to look down at my stomach. I can’t feel the warmth in my stomach now. I go and touch it and see my fingers are now red… red? Why would it be red? Maybe Cassie decided to mess with me, she would know about this. But, why is she still smiling, is she that happy with the date, or is there something I’m missing. I look back down at my stomach and see something sticking out, what is that? Why is there something sticking out of my stomach?

     As I continue staring at it, Cassie grabs hold of it and pulls it out. At first, I think she is helping me, but the pain is still there. My stomach is no longer warm, it feels… cold. Why? What’s happening? Cassie? Why is she smiling so wide? Why is she holding a knife? Why is she holding my shoulder now? Why can’t I see Cassie now? Since when was I looking up? I don’t remember falling, so why am I?

     Wait, I can still see Cassie watching me fall. Maybe she can save me. But I’m so far now. Her hand isn’t even reaching for me. She is just staring at me, with a smile. Is me dying that funny? What a shitty date. What a shitty girl. What a shitty life.