raxeira [on hold]

a x

(vb.) end, cancel, or dismiss suddenly and ruthlessly.

"say you'll remember me."

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i was going into the ninth grade and had been with the lolitas for four years — the longest i would ever stay put in a household — when i met raxeira again.

raxeira was always sudden with her entrances and perfectly encompassed what it meant to have a dramatic entrance. she must have had a lot of practice, drifting into people's lives, sucking up their sadness and replacing it into warmth. how much coldness she must bear in her soul, to carry the weight of all the people she's touched on her skinny back. dramatics and show were all she had left, the closest thing to emotions and being human as she had ever gotten.

i had been on the way home from the library, musing about what i could possibly say to excuse the fact that i had lost the library card and therefore did not check out any books as asked, when someone behind me shouted, "watch out!" i turned around, too late, and a flash of a girl riding a skateboard streaked across my eyesight before the said vehicle slammed full force into my legs, knocking me down and flattening me across the ground like life constantly enjoyed doing to me. i groaned, pain splintering through my bones.

"what is your problem?" i said, managing to prop myself on an elbow. "just what i thought. girls can't ride skateboards."

the emotion-distancing from the lolitas had really worn on me over the years. i was rude and brash to everyone, coming across as uncaring and harsh to everyone. it was not my fault. how can you not be mean to life and your surroundings when that is all it has ever done to you? i had been tossed from place to place like a little buoy on the rebellious sea and kicked around like a soccer ball in a toddler soccer match. there was nowhere for me to release my anger, and there is nothing other way out except releasing it on your surroundings. though i was with the caring and nurturing lolitas, i had never been so alone. to be so close to love but unable to love in fear of harming them is the worst sort of lonely.

she lifted up her chin, her face concealed by the angle of the light and shadows. she flicked up her skateboard and rolled it behind her. "i say, you were in the way and completely unaware of your surroundings. looks like boys don't have quick reflexes at all," she jabbed back at me.

"well, who can have quick enough reflexes to dodge your terrible skateboarding skills?"

she laughed. "i'd like to see you do better. you'll find no better skateboarder than me." she opened her mouth for another comeback, but her anger seemed to deflate as quickly as air from a balloon. the smirk dropped from her face and became a genuine and apologetic smile as if she had recognized something in my face and cut through my ever-present rudeness. "alright, let's stop. you okay?" she lifted out a hand to help me up.

i froze. i had seen this scene before, snapshotted a picture of this scene that had lodged itself in the back of my mind. i had stored it somewhere where i could not find it, and i searched through it, digging through dust and piles for this missing, musty piece of memory that i must have cherished before — something about an orphanage and a girl with eyes of broken glass, something about demons and a girl with a voice like a siren's.

"have i met you before?" the words flew out of my mouth as i stood up and dusted off my pants.

she grinned. "what do you think?" she slowly unlatched her helmet and sent it clattering on the floor.

she was most definitely different, more boyish and more of a wild sort of free. her hair had been styled into a wind-tousled pixie cut, as if every day she dissolved into the air and sent herself catapulting through lands that she had never seen before. her eyes were less broken but more of a lost hopelessness, the kind where your most prized china breaks and the pieces don't quite fit together. she had tried to piece herself together by fitting herself into this tomboyish, wild personality. it had not worked. it was too small to fit the whole universe inside of her. and yet she still lived on, trying to fit herself in a plot she already knew all too well.

she laughed again, hands brushing against her ripped black jeans. "look at you. you're so surprised!"

"raxeira?" i breathed, my voice gone as if the impact of the skateboard had remained.

"yes!" she said, her face lighting up. "you do remember me!"

"how could i forget you?"

and before i knew it, i was wrapped into a crushing embrace. it was a short and sweet one, like a burst of light and color whenever raxeira lifted her eyelids from her dainty blinks.

"you've changed so much," i stated simply, mind still listless. she was no longer that sorrowful, mysterious girl who seemed to harbor grief and pain in her small body, but a cheerful, outgoing girl who seemed reckless and unafraid to express feeling. i briefly wondered why she had chosen that certain skin to wear before me.

"haven't you?" she said, smiling wryly. she spun her skateboard with her feet before it skidded off to the side. she went and retrieved it. "whoops. what happened? you're so . . . distanced. what happened? are the lolitas not treating you well?"

"no. no. it's just that . . ." i stopped. raxeira's eyes were unfocused, staring at something behind me, right above my shoulder. "what is it?" i asked, turning around.

she took a step forward and plucked a feather off my shoulder. "a crow's," she said. "it fluttered from the sky, like a wind god tossing a lost possession back to you. it drifted and danced and landed there." she seemed entranced, as if the workings of gravity and air resistance had pulled her into the world of physics, as if suddenly she could see the vectors of the world. "how beautiful, how poetic it drifts" — her face suddenly went dark, clouded by shade.

"bad luck," she whispered, her voice a storm.

"what?" i asked. "what — what are you talking about?"

"what am i doing? i came here to warn you. be careful. i'll see you soon," she said, grabbing her skateboard and starting off in the opposite question. she waved and then she was gone, gone with the sunlight. she left me with a inky black feather in my hand and the aftermath of her hug, her phantom arms like feathers brushing along my back. 

A/N: Sorry for the inactivity. This is part of a double update, so read on . . .