"Seems like I'm fading fast."
-Lazy Sad, Ford
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The feel of the wind running its fingers through my dark hair and smoothing its palms over my cheeks is exhilarating.
I grip Alec's torso tighter as he speeds down the empty road, the black night hanging above us, as black as pitch. Fir trees line the road like silent, unmoving people watching us while we race recklessly down the rural roads that show no sign of life. It's like we're the only people left in the entire world.
"You like it?" he calls over the beating wind.
"I love it!" I call back excitedly.
He laughs and curves around a bend, but I'm not afraid of falling. Alec has that way with people. Making them feel brave.
He eventually slows a little as he turns down a wide dirt road with no trees surrounding it. I can hear the ocean in the distance. Finally, it comes into view ahead of us, just beyond a high cliff that the dirt path fades onto.
Alec kills the engine as we near the edge and climbs off, me following suite. His broad figure against the black sky, stars blinking and winking over the even blacker sea, waves rippling while the small tide washes against the white sand. And the moon, hanging high and bright.
"Where are we?" I ask absently, watching as Alec takes a seat at the edge of the cliff with his long legs dangling off. The wind is fairly light considering we're up this high, but it messes casually with Alec's dark brown locks with care. And just seeing him with this backdrop makes him look like a model for a perfume campaign.
"I don't know, but that's what's so good about it," he says softly, watching the moon's rays project over the small waves. I sit beside him, but even the sight of the ocean far below me doesn't scare me. Even it's foreboding depths, daring me to jump.
There is only the sound of the ocean, but it's almost inaudible over the intense beating of my heart from being this close to Alec.
"Are you going to tell me why we're here?" I ask after a long while of comfortable silence.
He shoots me an uncertain look and presses his full lips together. "Something has been bothering me, and I figured you wouldn't hate me as much if I showed you this place."
I frown and turn my full attention to him, forcing him to look at me. He lifts one leg up and cradles his shin in his hands, resting his chin on his knee. "Liv, are you part of their group?"
"The Socios?"
He nods, his eyes concerned at my startled reaction. I mean, why wouldn't I be surprised?
"No, I'm not in a group, but why..." I drift off, wondering why it would matter. Then realisation slams me in the face. He's worried that I'm a Socio. Because Fighters hate Socios. "You don't want me to be a Socio."
He runs his hand through his hair and sighs heavily. "Fighters and Socios don't get along. And I saw you today in the Common Room with Jasper-"
I abruptly stand and turn away, shaking my head in disbelief.
"Liv."
"This feud," I interrupt, "means nothing to me. And to think you'd bring me out here just to ask me if I'm one of them?" I scoff and take a few steps away from him.
He stands, his expression empty, and takes a step closer to me. "So you're a Socio then?"
My mouth drops open. Did he seriously not listen to a word of what I'd just said? "You're kidding me, right? I don't belong to anyone."
He scowls and snaps, "You were with Jasper today, and I want to know if you're with them so I don't go after someone I know is in a completely different world to me!"
"We're all the same, Alec! Don't you get that? All of us are insane. We're absolutely mad. Doesn't matter what situation made you this way, but we're all exactly the same!"
"But you prefer Jasper's side of it all," he says with confirmation, nodding his head.
I'm about to fire something back, when I stop, realisation kicking in for a second time in five minutes. "You're not worried I'm a Socio. You're worried I like Jasper."
He suddenly goes quiet, turning away and running his fingers through his hair again, stress warping his perfect features. "You don't know that."
"But it's true though, isn't it?"
He turns back around again, his face unreadable. "But if you like him, it makes you a Socio. It makes you one of them, and I couldn't bare it if that were the case."
Eyes ablaze, I cry back, "But I'm not one of them!"
He throws his hands into the air and yells back, his voice echoing off the cliff face, "Then prove it to me!"
A million new thoughts race through my head at once, cutting off any reason I have left. Not that I had much reason before. So instead of thinking, I close the distance between us, hold Alec's head in my hands and crash my lips against his.