It was a dark, grey world that evening with heavy cloud cover and a smell of rain. A small peach tree was standing with its branches reaching out forlornly with leaves having faded to a bright orange by the far reaching hand of the cold season; they looked like small, floating candle flames in the weak light. Wearing a black unzipped jacket with a hood shrouding his face was Tierce. His lanky frame was a rebellious mark on the shadowy landscape. Tierce rested one hand in his jacket pocket and the other he let dangle at his side with the fingers clutched around a black gun.
Tierce had hazel-brown eyes that were darting around as they searched for something in his surroundings. They didn’t find it and Tierce let out a heavy breath, there was nothing dangerous here. The wet grass tickled his bare feet as he walked to a small stone alcove etched into a large rock by the hands of erosion. Tierce huddled under the shelter of the rock and hugged himself for warmth in the chilly atmosphere. Then he closed his eyes and the gun rested on his knee precariously with Tierce’s spidery fingers gently laid upon its metallic, hazardous body.
Tierce slept half way, his mind was still partially working on what he needed to and everything else faded into oblivion. He still rested though and he needed it badly. Tierce’s body was run dry of strength from being awake for seventeen hours on full alert with the constant fear of being caught. But even though Tierce managed to keep a firm hold over some of his senses in his rejuvenating rest, he failed to notice a girl creep up on him and then stand before him. A girl dressed in a long black dress and with hair like the night sky reflected onto the ocean, the curls of it like the waves of the sea. In her small, soft hand a silvery-gray pistol was held delicately like a hot coal, it could burn her but if she was careful it would just stay in her hand like an uncomfortable, burning weight.
The girl was looking at Tierce with the wild look of the Amazon. Her eyes were livid and she opened her mouth and spoke a lone word “Why?”
Tierce woke up startled and immediately clenched his gun and pointed it upward. He was met with the dull Cyclops stare of a pistol’s barrel held in the hands of a girl, Laura. Laura was staring at him with an explosive fusion of hate, vengeance and questioning. Tierce blinked in surprise but then relaxed, he was resigned but he kept his gun pointed at her anyway. Laura asked again, “Why?!” she screamed at him and her voice cracked like a chip splintering off a crystal. .
Tierce stared at her calmly, perhaps a dash of apprehension in his eyes but still defiant. “Why what?” he asked Laura in a simple voice as if he were asking what time of day it was.
Laura glared at him with no restraint for the all consuming hate she possessed and shrieked “Why did you kill Evan? Right as we were dancing together?! He never did anything to you. Why Tierce? Why?!”
She was screaming hysterically, the intense strain upon her was obvious. Laura had stolen a pistol from her father’s private safe. That alone showed she was crazed beyond sanity. Tierce seemed to feel that this must be what happened and waited a moment before speaking. Tierce replied “You never knew this but Evan had been talking to Erika recently. You know how Erika was, sweet and innocent. She didn’t think Evan was thinking anything bad about her. You remember what happened last week, Erika was found bloody and dead in her room. There’s no proof except for a letter that Evan has already burned.”
Tierce paused for a moment as a tear welled in his eye like a shameful monster, choking up his throat with its rabid claws. Laura stared at him with a new look and emotion creeping into her face, the dawning revelation was infecting her rapidly. Tierce continued, “Evan abused her that night… and killed her. So I returned the favor and now Evan has gotten what he deserved. I don’t care what you do to me; kill me for all I care. I just want you to know that Evan was a disgusting, filthy piece of trash Laura. He tricked you into loving him just the same as he did to Erika.”
Tierce fell silently and his eyes closed, the gun dropped from his hand and hit the floor like a dead demon as Tierce awaited a bullet to take his life. He waited for it all to end, and then he could be with the best friend he had ever known, Erika… What felt like years elapsed for him as Tierce waited for the Grim Reaper to arrive. Then something did collide with him. A delicate, quivering body with its face nestled on his shoulder, covered in salty tears. Tierce turned his head and looked at Laura in shock and then slowly, hesitantly hugged her as she wept. The hate was gone from them and in that unforeseen embrace the two became allies. Tierce suddenly understood that guns were meant for murder as heavy as rain and they had been created by simply stupid people. Tierce swore to himself in that moment to never touch a gun again for he knew what they really did now, they broke love itself. Like how Erika was broken, taken… but there was still something here in the world for him and he would stay for it. Laura would probably still need his shoulder to cry on after this.